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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE
POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

EDITED BY

J. MCKEEN CATTELL

VOLUME LXX

JANUARY TO JUNE, 1907

NEW YORK

THE SCIENCE PRESS
1907

Press of
The New Era Printing Company

Lancaster, Pa.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

JANUARY, 1907

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA

By CHARLES ALMA BYERS

LOS ANGELES, CAL.

r I THROUGH temporarily losing control over the Imperial Valley
-*- irrigation system in southern California, there has been sug-
gested the possibility of creating an immense inland sea. This sea
would extend from Volcano Lake in Mexico to a point a few miles
north of Indio, California, and would spread over an area of 1,700
square miles, with a maximum depth of 280 feet. It would be fed by
an irrigation canal intersecting the Colorado Eiver near Yuma, Arizona,
and its overflow would be carried into the Gulf of California by the
lower part of the same river. It would submerge many acres of irri-
gated and irrigable land, about a dozen fair-sized towns of more or less
importance, several miles of the Southern Pacific Railroad, and a num-
ber of rich deposits of valuable minerals. And the ability to create
such a sea or lake lies simply in abandoning the present effort to
regain control over this irrigation system.

Dealing still further with possibilities of this nature, it may be
pointed out that the feed canal of this inland sea could be widened and
dredged; and thereby could be created a channel sufficient in dimensions
for the entry of boats from the Gulf. This would make it possible for
coast steamers to ply between ports on the Pacific Coast and a lake port
that might be established near the present site of the town of Indio, at
the foot of the eastern slope of the Sierra Madre Mountains, and with a
latitude almost parallel with the city of Los Angeles. It is true that
if the effort now being made to regain control over this rebellious sys-
tem of irrigation should be abandoned to-day, and nature be permitted
to reign supreme and unaided by man, it would be several years before
the Colorado River could possibly complete the creation of the lake;

VOL. lxx. — 1.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

RECLAMATION 5£R\ l.Ct.U.S Q S

LOWER COLORADO RIVER.
SHOWING IRRIGABLE LANDS

UNITED STATES a MEXICO,

■ ALJ F O H H, //

but since all this territory lies beneath the level of the sea. it is even
possible for engineers to change the course of the lower part of the
river, so that it would carry water from the Gulf of California to assist
'in the lake's completion. It may be remarked in this connection, how-
ever, that there is no probability at present of such a series of possi-
bilities being permitted to materialize. In the light of present con-
siderations, the value of the land and its products far outweighs the
possible benefits of such a lake and inland port. Nevertheless it is
a matter worthy of consideration.

The Colorado Desert, of which the greater part would be covered
by this inland sea, is bounded on the west by the Sierra Madre Moun-
tains, on the north and east hy the San Bernardino and Riverside
Ranges, and on the east by the Colorado River. As, therefore, would be

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA

New River below Rockwood. January 16, 1904.

Main Canal East of Calexico. December 16, 1904.

Exploring Salton Sea for the Source of the Waters. January 13, 1905.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

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Intake No. 1, from North Bank. January 22, 1905.

Intake No. 3, looking out toward the river. February 15, 1905.

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA 9

shown in a relief map, it is in the shape of an acute triangle, with its
base resting upon the Colorado River, on the east side, and extending
northwest and up the Coachella Valley toward Mt. San Jacinto. The
land slopes gradually from the river northwest to the Salton Sink,
which at the lowest point is 280 feet below sea level. Yuma, Arizona,
lies at the northeast corner of this triangle, and .is 137 feet above sea
level, which, therefore, gives the feed canal, created for irrigating, a fall
of 417 feet.

Indio, at the extreme northwest point of the triangle, is 22 feet
below sea level, while Volcano Lake, Mexico, is found to be very close
to sea level. The town of Indio is the end of a division of the Southern
Pacific Railroad, where the company has machine shops and main-
tains a large force of men. It is also a health resort, and has a fine
hotel and sanitarium. The other towns of this sunken area, which
would be submerged by such a lake, are: Salton, 265 feet below sea
level; Walters, 189; Thermal, 121; Imperial, 65; Alamo Bonito, 186;
Coachella, 65 ; Mortmier, 248 ; Volcano Spring, 265 ; Fish Spring, 230,
and Mecca, 18.

The town of Imperial, located near the center of the Imperial
Valley irrigation colony, is fast becoming a very important little city.
Four years ago it was unknown. Its site was only a part of the bare
Colorado Desert. An examination of the soil of this vicinity, how-
ever, revealed the fact that the only thing necessary to make it pro-
ductive was water, and in consequence a company was organized to
install a system of irrigation. A canal was dug that intersected the
Colorado River near Yuma, and by the water thus supplied the region
was awakened into life and fertility. As a result, in the past four
years, the town of Imperial has come into being, and about 110,000
acres of the surrounding land have been converted into a prospering
farming community, with a total population of over 10,000 persons.
And the limit has by no means yet been reached, for there is much
more of the region in a reclaimable condition.

Up to the time that this irrigation system placed Imperial upon
the map, the most important industry on the Colorado Desert was the
salt works at Salton. Salton Sink was a vast dry lake of solid salt,
and thousands upon thousands of tons of it were mined by simply
scraping it up into piles. This industry furnished employment to a
large corps of men, and the town of Salton came into being as the
result of its being made the headquarters of the New Liverpool Salt
Company.

But Salton at present is dead. The town and the works are buried
in a grave of water. The person who journeys thither to-day looks
upon a vast lake. The homes are deserted, the salt works are aban-
doned, and Salton Sink, once a dry lake of pure salt, lies transformed

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Earth Dam across Intake No. 1. May 29, 1905

into a billowy sea. Imperial not only became its peer in importance,
but its annihilator as well. The savior or the creator of the one
became the destroyer and the grave of the other. It was water from
the Colorado Eiver that brought Imperial into being, and it was
water from the same source that gave Salton its watery burial.

It was not with the spirit of rivalry, however, that Imperial
wrought Salton's annihilation. Instead, it is said to have been due
to neglect. The main canal for the Imperial Valley irrigation system,
which makes use of about fifty miles of what was once the channel of
the old Alamo Eiver, draws its water from the Colorado Eiver at a
point about ten miles below Yuma, and near the international
boundary line between California and Mexico. At this intersecting

View looking South across Intake No. 3. May.29, 1905.

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA

1 1

point there are three intakes or openings, for each of which there
should have been provided a head-gate. This was not done, however,
and over a year ago, during high water in the Colorado, these intakes
began to admit more water than was necessary for use for irrigation.
This surplus, which at times was very large, naturally sought the lowest
part of the desert, and in consequence Salton Sink became ' Salton Sea.'
Edwin Duryea, Jr., C. E., of San Francisco, who has made a
careful study of the situation for the Southern Pacific Railroad, says
that since October, 1904, when the canal first began to carry a surplus,
the water in Salton Sink has steadily risen at the average rate of over
one half inch per day. At times, during floods, this has even been

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Unitsed Head-Gate between Intakes Nos. 1 and 2. May 29, 1905.

temporarily increased to the rate of two inches per day. The water
used by the irrigation system varies with the seasons from nothing in
rainy weather to about 1,000 cubic feet per second; and Mr. Duryea,
to show the variations in the surplus of water carried into the region,
has made a number of measurements that leave no doubt as to the
importance of the danger threatened. On February 14, 1905, the canal
received 2,500 cubic feet per second, while about 30,000 cubic feet
passed down the river; June 5, about 8,000 cubic feet went to the
canal per second and 60,000 down the river; July 18, 18,000 to the
canal and 7,000 down the river; October 17, 7,000 to the canal and
none down the river; November 20, 6,000 to the canal and 128 down
the river; December 13, 10,300 to the canal and none down the river.
On November 29, there was a flood in the Colorado River, and it was
estimated that the river at Yuma carried a maximum flow of 110,000
cubic feet per second, of which about one-half went into the canal,
and thence into Salton Sea.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

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THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA

S. P. Track near Walton, looking West. October 19, 1905.

The result of this surplus flow, due to the loss of control over the
irrigation system, has been the creation of a lake averaging about
forty miles in length by ten miles in width, and therefore covering an
area of about 400 square miles. The Southern Pacific Railroad has
been compelled to build many miles of new road to skirt this embryo
lake, and the salt works of the New Liverpool Salt Company are
immersed in more than twenty feet of water. This was the condition
at the close of the vear 1905, and the size of the lake is still increasing.

The first attempt to control this rebellious system of irrigation was
made in March, 1905. It was a very frail effort, however, and the
construction was washed away before it was entirely finished. Four
other attempts followed in almost monthly succession, and each in turn
met the same fate as the first. Then came the sixth. It, unlike the
former ones, was undertaken on a larger scale and with a fuller
realization that the problem to be confronted was a grave one. A
large force of men was employed, and the attempt was prosecuted
with vigor. Two hundred men, twenty teams, two pile-drivers and
two stern-wheel river steamers were employed, and the work was carried
on night and day. The intention was to construct a 600-foot dam
across the west branch of the river, and thereby control the canal service
by diverting the water into the east branch — except at such times
and in such quantities as were necessary for irrigation. The dam was
made of brush woven into mats and reinforced by several rows of
piles. The flood of November 29, however, came before it was finished,
entirely covering the work with water and washing it away, and thus
destroying the sixth attempt.

But the effect of this failure was only to more thoroughly convince
the Southern Pacific Railway Company, which had assumed charge of
the work in June, that the canal system must be controlled. The com-
pany almost immediately, or in December, 1905, awarded a contract for
the seventh attempt, and in January of 1906 work was again com-
menced.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Intake No. 2, looking out toward the river. October 17, 1905.

The seventh attempt was pushed with even greater determination
than the sixth. A larger corps of men was employed, and the work
was planned upon a more substantial scale. It progressed quite slowly
on account of high water at different times, but at last it is finished,
and the engineers feel confident that the problem, after a year and a
half, is now solved. The gates were declared completed about the
middle of July, but on account of the swollen condition of the Colo-
rado Kiver they have not yet been tested. The gate on the California
side is constructed to admit 20,000 cubic feet per second, and the pres-
ent flow of the river is in excess of 30,000 cubic feet per second. As
soon as the river goes down to its normal condition the gate will be
tested, and the engineers who have managed its construction assert
that there is no possibility of its not standing the test.

Details of Sixth Attempt, November 20, 1905.

THE POSSIBILITIES OF SALTON SEA

Details of Sixth Attempt, November 20, 1905.

The total cost of the seventh and last attempt to control this irriga-
tion system has been $40,000, or thereabouts. There are two head-
gates — one, of concrete, on the California side, and one, of wood, on the
Mexico side. The one of concrete is built to stand the greater portion,
by far, of the strain, and it has every appearance of being amply sub-
stantial. The cost of this gate alone was $24,770.47. It necessitated
the excavation of 12,637.1 cubic yards of earth and 5,700.81 cubic feet
of rock, and required the use of 1,335 barrels of cement, 1,204.85 cubic
yards of sand, gravel and rock, 25,722 pounds of steel bars for rein-
forcement and 791 pounds of expanded metal for gate facings. The
work is being engineered by Mr. C. F. Cory, an engineer of wide
repute. '

Although these dams or head-gates seem to promise a solution to
the Salton Sea problem, there is nevertheless excuse for apprehensions
of further trouble. The banks of the Colorado River in this vicinity
are soft and gravelly and very easily eroded, and on this account there
will always be the possibility of new channels being cut around these
head-gates, especially during flood seasons.

Details of Sixth Attempt, November 20, 1905.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

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THE POSSIBILITIES OF S ALTON SEA 17

Whether or not this attempt, when tested, proves successful, how-
ever, the damage being continually done to this region can not be ex-
pected to end at once. Several hundred thousands of dollars damage
has already been done by the truant river, and even if the surplus flow
into the Sink is stopped by the new gates, the lake that covers Salton
and its salt works will still remain, which evaporation, almost unaided,
will have to drain. It will therefore be a long time before Salton, the
submerged headquarters of the New Liverpool Salt Works, can be re-
placed upon the map and the Southern Pacific Eailroad reconstructed
upon its old road bed.

The damage that threatens this sunken area, in case the river is
not controlled, has already been briefly mentioned. If for some un-
foreseen and improbable cause the present attempt should fail or be
abandoned, and no other attempts inaugurated, the water would
gradually cut the present irrigation canal so deep that the entire flow
of the river would be side-tracked into Salton Sea. The water would
slowly rise until a lake would be created as large in area as, or larger
than, Great Salt Lake of Utah, and the entire Imperial Valley, which
thus far has not suffered, would be covered with water. The lake
would not only rise to the sea-level line, but instead, on account of the
elevation of the enclosing rim, it would have to reach to an elevation
of fifteen or twenty feet above sea level, at which point it would over-
flow the south rim near Volcano Lake and pass southward until it
would again enter the Colorado Eiver near the Gulf. Should it be
the desire at any time to convert this area into a sea-level lake, this
outlet channel, which would pass over very loose soil, could be dredged
very easily into a sea-level inlet from the Gulf.

To fill this sunken area with water from the Colorado River would
require many years. The average flow of the river during a year is
said to be about 15,000 cubic feet per second. This entire amount
conveyed into the lake would be subject to a very great shrinkage from
evaporation, and it is even possible that this loss would become so
great after the lake had spread over a certain area as to equal the
inflow from the river, although such is hardly probable. In any case,
all attempted computations of such nature would necessarily be very
inaccurate, and may as well be omitted.

In studying the possibility of this area becoming the bed of an
inland sea there are even more considerations to be met than are
offered by the Imperial Valley land colony and the salt works at Salton.
Gilbert E. Bailey, M. E., of Los Angeles, a recognized authority on the
mineral resources of California, has made a thorough study of this
region, and to the writer he has furnished a partial list of its possibili-
ties in this direction. In addition to the salt deposits, large quantities
of nitrate, sulphate and carbonate of soda are found at various point?

1 8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

along the rim of the desert, and in the southern part there are about
300 acres covered with mud volcanoes or geysers that spout forth mud
of various colors and consistency, containing rare minerals which some
day may become of importance. Oil-bearing rocks are found along
the west side, forming a belt at the foot of the mountains and extend-
ing into the area lying below sea level, from which ooze heavy asphaltic
oils, and which will some time develop into a rich oil-producing dis-
trict. South of the California line, in Mexico, and lying below sea
level, there are also valuable and extensive deposits of sulphur; and
then in the surrounding mountains, which, however, would not suffer
from the lake, are found large deposits of gold, silver and copper and
mines of kunzite and tourmaline gems.

Altogether, this is an interesting country. It offers many realities,
and as many, or more, possibilities. At present it is battling with an
unusual problem, and we are assured by engineers that it stands on
the eve of victory — at last. It has met defeat bravely six times, and
therefore let us hope that the seventh attempt will be crowned with
reward.

Author's Note. — About the first of last November, shortly after this article
was written, the dams and headgates constructed to shut the Colorado River
out of Salton Sink were put into use. Up to this time the Southern Pacific
Company, after finishing the headgates mentioned, had continued work until
it had practically diked the river for a distance of more than ten miles, and
had expended upon the work a sum in excess of $1,500,000. The test of the
completed work at that time seemed to assure the successful capture of the
runaway river, and there was general rejoicing. A month later, however, the
river rose to flood tide, and on the night of December 7, last, it again broke
through its natural channel bounds and is again pouring into Salton Sink.
The condition to-day is as bad as it was six months ago, and the possibilities of
a permanent ' Salton Sea ' are now more pronounced than ever. The river
must be controlled within six months, or the Imperial Valley will suffer greatly.
The Southern Pacific Company, at present, hesitate to again fight the river,
and it is probable that the United States government will be asked to lend
assistance. The recent break occurred just below the new dike, and has already
eroded a canyon-like channel. As pointed out by the writer, the banks of the
Colorado River in this vicinity are low and of a very loose material, conse-
quently easily eroded, and to assure a lasting solution to the problem about
twenty more miles of dike will be necessary. This, too, must be built soon —
before the river channel above the break is cut much deeper.

THE SANITATION OF AIR

BY KONRAD MEIER

NEW YORK CITY

HYGIENE, as a science, traces the causes of disease to which man-
kind is exposed in every phase of life. Its practical value lies
in the preventing of these causes, through the sanitation of our sur-
roundings and the rational care of body and mind. The gradual im-
provement of public health and the incident saving of vital energies as
the result of true hygienic living would easily make this field of
knowledge rank among the most potent factors in the development of
races. Unfortunately, its greater possibilities are not yet being
realized, for want of application, which is, as yet, too much confined
to the professions directly concerned with matters of health. The prin-
ciples of hygiene must be brought home to the people at large, must
grow into and form the habits of our daily life. They should, in fact,
be applied in every craft and trade, led by the professions, as, for
instance, by architects and engineers, upon whom depends largely the
healthfulness of our homes, of a multitude of public utilities, and of
the commonwealth as a whole. In architecture and engineering, the
problems bearing on health should be approached in a spirit inde-
pendent of mercenary considerations. They ought to be solved strictly
on their merits, with a fair perspective towards hygienic quality in all
questions of serviceability, ornamental features and structural needs.
Such quality is often necessary to the full realization of the aim, and
essential to true artistic value as well as to material success. We
can not ignore the laws and lessons of nature in building up the city
of enduring beauty.

In crowded industrial and commercial centers, the excessive vitia-
tion of the atmosphere has grown to be an important factor bearing
on public health. While a systematic supply of pure air to buildings
has long been recognized as a necessity, the state of the outer air has
not yet received the attention it deserves, and is too often accepted as
a matter beyond control. Nevertheless, an inquiry into the sources
of its pollution will readily show that much of it might be prevented.
That it ought to be prevented is becoming more apparent as its bear-
ing on prevailing diseases is definitely being established. The move-
ment for better ventilation would also gain through a closer study of
the causes of impure air. Abundant literature exists on standards of
purity, on temperature and humidity, also on the amount of air to be

2o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

supplied per capita, but comparatively little effort has been made
to trace out and bring to light the less evident and often unsuspected
factors of contamination, which indicate, or at least should help to
determine, the logical method of relief.

The sanitation of the air is a field which has hardly been recognized
as such, at least it is not carried on systematically, with that end in
view, and the results of present efforts, on the whole, are distinctly
behind the progress made in other lines. Indeed, its failure to meet
the aggravated needs of our crowded and growing cities can actually
be traced on their vital statistics.

The Bearing of Impure Air on Health

An exceptionally clear exposition of the process of breathing is con-
tained in the short essay, ' Air, and its Eelation to Vital Energy,' by
Professor S. H. Woodbridge, of the Massachusetts Institute of Tech-
nology. The oxidation of organic matter within the human body is
likened to the process of combustion in a boiler furnace. This analogy
applies to every essential point and shows that the conditions making
for efficiency in artificial heat production are also those which bear on
vital energy. The intensity of combustion within the human body
depends upon the rate of exchange between the carbonic acid contained
in the venous blood and the oxygen brought into the lungs, or the
rapidity at which the waste products brought in from the system are
being diluted. A slight abnormal accumulation of this gas in the air
cells of the lungs would check this outward leakage or expulsion of
waste products and retard regeneration of the blood, but respiration
automatically regulates this function. Exhausted air, with deficiency
in oxygen and excess of carbonic acid, to sustain equal force, thus
requires increased respiration, an unconscious effort, gradually lapsing
as the gathering waste products react upon the blood and through it
upon vitality. The weakened light of a candle flame in exhausted
room air very aptly illustrates also its effect on human beings.

Exhausted Air. — Recent experiments by Fluegge, the eminent Ger-
man investigator, seemingly contradict this theory. At least they make
it appear that the paucity of oxygen and the simultaneous increase of
carbonic acid and other waste products, have no appreciable ill effect on
the average adult, but that the depression of spirits, headache and
drowsiness felt in crowded, ill-ventilated assembly rooms are principally
due to disturbance of the thermal functions of the body through heat
and moisture. Since these excesses in temperature and humidity
always accompany exhaustion they should certainly be regarded as
contributory factors, which help to depress the vital powers according
to their prominence. It has been asserted, also, that the human organ-
ism has long been used to the frequent breathing of foul air, and will

THE SANITATION OF AIR 21

adapt itself to any condition tolerable at all in the long run. This is
true to an extent, as to the products of breathing as well as to tempera-
ture, but it is more than likely that any immunity from the habit of
living in badly used air is gained at the expense of vitality.

Contaminated Air. — As distinguished from ' exhaustion ' of air, or
shortage of oxygen, with the corresponding increase of carbonic acid
and other waste products, the term ' contamination ' may be applied to
impurities of gaseous and solid nature, aside from the normally un-
avoidable. Tins includes, for instance, gases and vapor from industrial
sources, also smoke, soot and dust with its attendant bacteria.

The amount of carbonic acid found in air is commonly regarded as
a measure of the degree of vitiation, but wherever pollution of the air
is likely to occur independent of an increase of combustion or respira-
tion that method of testing the purity naturally is deceptive. Indeed,
contamination quite often predominates exhaustion, and should always
be considered by itself, as a separate factor, according to the nature of
the case. While the effect of exhausted air may have been over-
estimated, the bearing of contamination on health does not seem to be
sufficiently realized. Its claims on vitality are of a different nature.
Any admixture of foreign gases may react directly upon the blood.
Such poisoning, however, is mostly due to local sources, readily de-
tected and prevented. By far the greater mischief is done by the
solid impurities afloat in the air. Although these are normally arrested
by the moist, mucous surfaces of nose and throat, they will, under
certain conditions, enter the lungs, fill the minute air chambers and
lodge there indefinitely. Through life in smoky or dusty surroundings
large portions of the lungs become useless in this manner, invite decay
and the fatal attacks of bacteria. Dr. Louis Ascher, in publishing the
results of his exhaustive investigations on the subject, has shown con-
clusively that smoky atmosphere encourages diseases of the respiratory
organs, materially shortens the life of consumptives and bears dis-
tinctly on the mortality of afflicted districts. The charts of distribu-
tion of pulmonary tuberculosis in Chicago show indeed the cases to be
most frequent near the cluster of railway stations. The appalling con-
tingent of lung patients sent to the Eocky Mountains from our smoky
cities of the middle west gives a sad testimony to these facts.

Still greater mischief is done by solid impurities, especially dust,
as the carriers of disease germs. True, the best authorities now agree
that the presence of microbes in the respiratory organs does not neces-
sarily produce disease, and that the germs must first make their way
into the system in order to develop, and find it in poor condition before
they can do serious harm. Predisposition, in the form of inflammation
combined with lowered vitality, seems therefore necessary to develop the
more serious pulmonary diseases. Unfortunately these predisposing

vol. lxxx. — 2.

22 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ailments are very prevalent and almost unavoidable, to judge only by
the numerous traces of mucous sputum displayed on public thorough-
fares, mostly witnesses of chronic catarrh. The first irritation is not
always caused by exposure to cold, dryness or humidity, but often by
soot and dust, or the depressing conditions of indoor and city life
generally. As to the effect of these impurities on diseased tissue, we
have recently come to authoritative information through the report of
the committee on the influence of climate, made before the National
Association for the Study and Prevention of Tuberculosis. By analysis
of the various factors contributing to a successful cure, it was found
that good results may be secured under most widely differing climatic
conditions, the benefits of relative humidity, temperature, altitude, etc.,
being practically dependent upon the patient's general condition or con-
stitution. It has been found, however, that, when other things are
equal and the same attention is paid to diet and hygiene, the best
results have always been noted where the atmosphere was purest. In-
deed the report places ' Abundance and bacteriological and chemical
purity of the air ' as first among the beneficial influences, while the
value of sunshine and the therapeutic effects of coolness, dryness, etc.,
are placed next in order of importance.

Surprising results seem to have been obtained lately by the out-
door treatment of pneumonia, in which very probably the greater
purity of the air is a contributing factor. The success of the fresh-
air colony at Seabreeze also confirms the theory that the cure is greatly
assisted by the pure sea air, that is, by the absence of dust and bacteria,
which irritate, and continually bring renewed infection to the recep-
tive diseased parts. It is for this reason that outdoor life, almost any-
where, is beneficial to lung patients, since they avoid at least some of
the multifarious, insidious forms of contamination peculiar to the air
in the average dwelling.

All these facts point to the meaning of impure atmosphere in
densely populated cities, where the seeds of disease are most abundant,
and the field for infection is prepared for it, fertilized, so to speak, by
all sorts of conditions and modes of life, more or less beyond one's
control. A good crop of pneumonia and kindred diseases seems as-
sured for the winter season, when the tax on vitality is severest, and
indoor life in unsanitary quarters supplies the opportunity. This
seems almost sufficient to explain the present situation in our large
cities, which has brought about the organization of the Pneumonia
Commission through the New York Board of Health. In this con-
nection, Dr. Herman M. Biggs, the general medical officer of the
board, has stated, that the number of victims claimed yearly by pneu-
monia increases steadily and alarmingly. In New York City alone
during the first six months of 1905 one third the total number of

THE SANITATION OF AIR 23

deaths were charged to acute respiratory diseases and pulmonary tuber-
culosis. During that period the deaths from these causes numbered
14,091. In the corresponding period of the year before they aggre-
gated 10,890.

When we compare the efforts of the sanitary corps in this particular
direction with the systematic and thorough work done in checking cer-
tain epidemics, we can not fail to note the lack of a comprehensive
system in fighting diphtheria, grip, pneumonia and other respiratory
diseases, which now claim a majority of victims. The situation seems
to be recognized, but is met only to a limited extent. Much good has
been accomplished through sanitary inspection, stricter enforcement
of the regulations against expectorating in public places, also by ex-
hibits and other educational work, but there are many other possible
lines of action which should be taken up as parts of an organized cam-
paign for the sanitation of the air. Since the most promising measures
must always be of the preventive order, we should, above all, study the
causes which lead to unwholesome atmosphere.

The Causes of Impure Air

Quantities of smoke, vapor, dust and other offensive waste products
are constantly discharged into the atmosphere of urban districts. The
emanation of all this matter is so rapid that it becomes visible within
a few hours whenever the purifying breezes die away, and yet the
gathering gloom is not generally recognized as pollution of the air,
but rather taken for a change in weather. According to the seasons,
the solid particles like soot and dust will cause a haze, or encourage
the formation of mist and fog, sometimes, during the winter, depriving
a city for days of the life-giving sun.

The sources that contribute to this pollution of urban atmosphere
naturally increase with the population, while the dispersal of impure
matter by the natural air currents becomes more sluggish and uncertain
with the growing areas of urban settlements. The density of popula-
tion in certain metropolitan districts is easily ten times that of smaller
cities. The rate of vitiation of the air through smoke and other waste
matter must therefore be at least that much greater. Comparatively
speaking, the conditions of health in a crowded community are like
those prevailing on board ship. The living space is still smaller than
that of the average city dwelling, but the elements contributing to the
vitiation are about the same per capita, hence more concentrated and
more in evidence. We know that extra labor and care are necessary
on a vessel to maintain the air in a tolerable state, quite irrespective
of ventilation. In cities, where dwellings and shops are built not only
closer together, but are literally piled up on each other, the general
contamination is likewise bound to become unwholesome unless special

24 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

care is taken in disposing of waste matter that may find its way into
the air. No doubt more is being done in this direction than in former
days, but the rapid concentration of living quarters and industrial
shops brings with it new conditions. It should be remembered that
it is our pressing duty, and part of that civilization which has built
cities for millions, to keep them not only inhabitable, but healthful,
wholesome and pure. Elbert Hubbard in the course of his travels
once observed that ' The path of civilization is strewed with tin cans/
This certainly insinuates that we have not yet arrived, while tin cans
and a multitude of other witnesses of neglect in civic duty are seen
along the path.

The Smoke Nuisance. — Smokeless combustion is not only feasible
for almost any kind of coal, but more economical if properly attended.
The principal difficulty exists in the design of the proper furnace to
suit the fuel and to meet the conditions under which it is burned.
There ought to be no restriction on the use of bituminous or any other
coal. On the other hand, no excuse should be accepted for black smoke
from any source within city limits. If not willing or able to suppress it,
the offensive industry must be made to move. But all the smaller and
innumerable sources of medium, light and invisible smoke should also
receive attention. They emit, in reality, by far the largest share of it
in the average commercial and residential community, less noticeable
because more diluted, but none the less objectionable. The reduction
of this smoke is, for practical reasons, beyond control of local health
authorities, but it can gradually be eliminated through individual
action; that is, by the general concentration of light, heat and power
service. The movement in this direction was started long ago with
the introduction of central stations for light and power, but it is
capable of much greater extension, particularly for heating and power.
The bulk of the fuel should be burned at the mine, or at tide-water
outside of city limits. Such concentration of combustion for various
needs represents a material saving in the total amount of fuel con-
sumed, and, therefore, of the smoke produced. It would incidentally
avoid the handling of much coal and ashes and reduce the large amount
of exhaust steam now seen pouring away from the numerous individual
plants in certain neighborhoods. On still days, these vapors contribute
perceptibly to the murkiness of the atmosphere. The use of steam
power for transportation in urban and densely populated suburban dis-
tricts has long since ceased to be a necessary evil and should have been
prohibited years ago. It is gratifying to state that at last this much-
needed economic and sanitary reform seems about to be realized.

Street Dust. — Dust of the streets is one of the principal elements in
polluting the atmosphere. It is made up of innumerable substances
utterly defying description. To what extent it permeates the air, even

THE SANITATION OF AIR 25

in buildings, is proved by a microscopic examination of deposits from
furniture, which shows a large percentage of animal refuse, mostly
horse offal, ground up by the street traffic. ' Dirt is useful matter in
a wrong place,' was one of the lamented Colonel Waring's maxims.
He had, indeed, not only succeeded in removing it, but was in a fair
way to make it pay for the cost of removal. Sanitation and economy
often go hand in hand.

Concerted action is necessary to suppress this nuisance. No one
should complain about dust who is not doing his share in preventing it.
Each citizen must be his own sanitary officer and each sanitary officer
and employee must be made to attend to his duties on public property.
Corporations operating public conveyances should also be strictly held
up to their duties. A case which illustrates this point is the New
York Subway. Dust from the streets, mixed with sputum and sweep-
ings from within, are permitted to accumulate indefinitely on a road-
bed of gravel, which can never be thoroughly cleaned. The trains
continually stir up some of this accumulation and impart it to the air.
This is an inexcusable offense from a hygienic point of view. We need
only consider that an underground route has not, like a surface rail-
way, the natural assistance of wind, rain and sun in maintaining salu-
brity, and that it requires extra care and attention to make up for such
disadvantage. The drippings of oil will not altogether bind or lay
the dust, and the present method of drawing in air through dirty side-
walk gratings can not improve matters in this respect. An easily
cleaned surface and effective mechanical means should be provided to
keep the road-bed and the entire tunnel ' clean as a hound's tooth.'
The stuffy atmosphere often noticed in the subway is largely traceable
to these impurities, which are more objectionable than the heat and the
exhaustion of the air. The latter, after all, may be regarded as tem-
porary drawbacks, while dust and bacteria inhaled during the shortest
transit will cause infection, threatening disease to any one predisposed.
Unless built and operated with a reasonable appreciation of hygienic
science, subways may at times become a serious menace to public health,
especially when grip and similar epidemics are prevailing.

Causes for Impure Air in Buildings. — Among the numerous factors
which may contribute to vitiate the air in buildings, some can always
be eliminated, while others are unavoidable and should be counter-
acted by ventilation, in one form or another. Acting on the principle
that prevention is better than cure, we should pay attention first to the
avoidable sources. Waste matter of any kind is certain to contaminate
the air without necessarily being perceptible by odor or by any of the
customary methods of testing. Dust and dried-up sputum from the
street, brought in by the air or by clothing, unless frequently removed,
will permeate carpets and draperies, from where it is continually

26 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

stirred up, thus filling the air with all sorts of impurities, irritating
and disease-bearing. The stuffy atmosphere one notices when entering
certain assembly halls and churches is nearly always due to lack of
energy or method in cleaning, quite often through inaccessibility in
* dirt corners ' or other hygienic fault in the design of buildings.

The combustion of gas and kerosene in living rooms rapidly vitiates
the air. Each burner will use up as much oxygen as several persons,
besides generating heat, moisture and often sulphurous acid gas, spe-
cially injurious to nose and throat. Stoves or grates for heating or
cooking by gas should invariably be connected to a -flue to carry off the
products of combustion, Even if used for lighting only, the discharge
from lamps becomes very objectionable without ample provision for its
escape from the room.

Smoke and vapors are unavoidable wherever cooking is going on,
but through immediate and effective removal at the starting point,
their spread can be prevented. There is no excuse for any odors in-
vading the living rooms; indeed, if the vapors are properly taken care
of, the air in the kitchen itself can be kept reasonably wholesome and
pure.

Dust, smoke, gases or hot air from industrial sources which are
often allowed to contaminate the air in workshops and laboratories
can be classed as avoidable factors, since it is nearly always possible to
localize them. Grinding wheels, buffers or other machinery should be
equipped for this purpose with devices for mechanical suction to pick
up and remove the dust or fumes before they can spread and do harm.
Poisonous gases in laboratories should also be removed as soon as
generated. Waste heat which would otherwise become annoying should
be neutralized by insulation. The design of such arrangements re-
quires special training and experience, but the principles of it can
easily be understood and insisted upon by laymen.

The Vitiation of the Air through Heating, Cooling and Ventilating
Apparatus. — Every one is familiar with the discomforts of modern
heating apparatus. The most frequent complaints are of dryness,
disagreeable odors or stuffy atmosphere, sometimes combined with over-
heating. These conditions are so common that they have almost come
to be regarded as unavoidable drawbacks, more or less peculiar to cer-
tain methods of heating.

Since the capacity of air to absorb moisture increases with its tem-
perature, heating, by any method, will have a drying effect. In clear
cold weather, when the atmosphere out of doors contains little moisture,
the relative percentage indoors may drop below a point to which most
persons are acclimated. Unless made up by internal sources, some
artificial supply of moisture seems desirable in such cases. It is, how-
ever, not necessary and not desirable, as is often recommended, to go

THE SANITATION OF AIR 27

beyond, or even as far as, making up the deficiency caused by heating,
since the human system is used to considerable changes without any
real discomfort. Indeed, dry air, if pure, is probably more beneficial
to normal adults than moist air. The principal reason why the demand
for moisture in heated rooms has arisen is the irritating effect of float-
ing dust which has been set in motion by the heating system, directly
or indirectly. In the worst form this may be noticed with hot-air
heating through floor registers, which invite all sorts of rubbish to fall
into the flue, only to be dried and sent up again, often directly into
one's nose. Radiators also, especially those with inaccessible surfaces,
will gather dust. When cold, it will lay there and molest no more
than that on furniture, but as soon as heat is turned on, the tiny drops
of moisture, which always cling to these solid particles, will evaporate.
Free of this weight, the dust is easily set in motion by the currents of
warm air rising from the radiator, as may often be seen by the tell-tale
shadows on the wall above. Heating apparatus thus contaminates the
air with dust and bacteria which otherwise would lay undisturbed and
out of harm's way. Moistening of the air will not prevent this to any
extent. It increases, in fact, another source of contamination, still too
common with modern heating systems — the dry distillation of the
organic matter on hot surfaces. This phenomenon has recently been
studied by the noted hygienists Professors Esmarch and Nussbaum,
who have independently reached the conclusion, that organic dust begins
to distil or singe when a radiator reaches a temperature of about
165° F., and that this process is rather encouraged by moisture, prob-
ably because the hygroscopic matter clings longer to the heated surfaces
and is therefore decomposed before it rises up in the air. To reduce'
the vitiating effect of heating apparatus, we must insist on the most
accessible and simple styles of radiators, on which any dust can readily
be seen and is apt to be removed, and on ample heating surfaces of
moderate temperature which will tend to avoid the decomposition of
organic matter.

Overheating by itself must be considered as vitiating the air; at
least in so far as it makes it unfit, or less wholesome, according to some
noted hygienists who have thoroughly investigated its effect. It seems,
at any rate, to give the air a lifeless quality, which soon imparts itself
to the victim of our wasteful modes of heating.

Apparatus for artificial moistening, which is now often installed
in connection with heating and ventilating systems, aside from the
liability of exceeding the desirable humidity, also gives opportunity for
contamination of the air supply. Unless the devices are designed on
sanitary principles and intelligently attended to, they are very liable to
become foul and malodorous, if not unhealthy.

Like the heating of buildings, artificial cooling may also have un-

28 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

wholesome effects. Special provision must be made for drying the air
to keep down the relative humidity in the rooms so cooled. In moist
and warm weather it would otherwise reach the saturation point. Such
a condition is not only uncomfortable, but can become very unhealthy.
The science of artificial cooling is as yet very little understood by
the average layman and any devices which do not give perfect control
over humidity must be cautioned against.

Ventilating apparatus itself may become a source of contamination
if improperly designed, operated or maintained. Air filters have been
found, for instance, which were intended to arrest the dust, but actually
also arrest nearly all the fresh air. Some of these filters can not be
cleaned or renewed without spilling the very impurities collected into
the air ducts and thence into the rooms. Mechanical ventilating de-
vices too often defeat their usefulness by lack of control over air cur-
rents and temperature, which either puts them out of service, or the
persons for whose benefit they were intended.

Vitiation through Animal Life. — The last, but not the least, among
the sources of vitiation is the presence of animal life or of man.
Theoretically, perhaps, this may be called the only unavoidable factor,
or the one which must be met by ventilation. The exhalation of car-
bonic acid in place of the oxygen inhaled reduces the life-giving quality
of the air, or its power of regenerating the blood. Exhaled air, more-
over, is charged with vapor and organic matter. The substance, called
effluvia, which emanates from the surface of the human body is also
of organic nature. It is harmless enough when permitted to dry and
disperse, but in the moist and warm air of over-crowded rooms it
quickly putrefies and becomes obnoxious. It can be recognized by that
pungent odor characteristic of a sweltering mass of people. Whatever
ill effects may be due to effluvia come through the action of odor on
the nerves, rather than through inhaling this comparatively innocuous
matter. The excess of heat and moisture produced by an audience as
previously mentioned is now regarded as more than a temporary dis-
comfort, quite aside from the danger in subsequent exposure to cold.
Exhaled air, effluvia and heat thus combine, in varying proportions, to
make room air unfit for breathing. In crowded meeting places they
are the principal sources of vitiation, which may practically determine
the artificial supply of air, while, for instance, in dwellings, offices and
shops with liberal space allowance and plenty of exposure they are
often a negligible quantity compared with the sources of contamination.

Suggestions for Relief
The remedy for the unhealthy conditions described naturally lies
in systematic sanitation of the air; indoors as well as out-of-doors.
The methods of carrying on such work are indicated by the causes

THE SANITATION OF AIR 29

themselves, and some remedies have already been suggested. In regard
to open air they are practically limited to measures of prevention.

Sanitation. — The New York Board of Health now sends school-
children to dispensaries and specialists for deafness and defective eye-
sight, in the hope of reclaiming them from the dullness consequent to
these ills. This unquestionably helps to keep certain contagious dis-
eases under control, and it may be justified on other grounds, but it
should not be forgotten that certain unsanitary conditions, to which
such diseases can often be traced, barely receive any attention in the
sense of an organized campaign for purifying the air. Particular
attention should be paid to the suppression of all markets and other
nuisances affecting the salubrity of streets and squares surrounding
schools and hospitals. The maintenance of public buildings on strict
sanitary lines by systematic processes of cleaning, disinfection, repaint-
ing and repairing is also too much neglected. The movement for the
better housing of the poor, however much has been accomplished, can
only be called a beginning. Hundreds of the better sort of tenements
are being built, but thousands are needed. If the health board has the
right to condemn old rookeries, to order repairs, to pass on workshops
in dingy basements and the like, there is much to be done yet on these
lines.

The campaign against expectorating, in which Dr. Darlington, the
present New York health commissioner, has taken an active part, is
most commendable. It certainly reduces the constant danger of in-
fection, but it does not lead far enough toward stopping its causes,
the chronic catarrh and other ills largely induced by untidy streets and
buildings, public and private.

Sanitary inspection has long been organized in many cities, for
certain classes of buildings, but it must include all public conveyances,
conveniences, highways and byways in order to be really effective. It
should be supplemented by jurisdiction over hygiene in lighting, plumb-
ing, heating and ventilation of new buildings, and in the maintenance
of streets, sewers and other public works. This may seem to be a large
ground to cover for the average staff of health officers, but it is not
altogether a question of men, but one of influence or power of the
board over other departments, which should be made to carry out their
own work with due regard for hygienic requirements. Sanitation on
these lines would be of particular value as an education to the citizens
by way of example.

Hints on Ventilation. — The foregoing arguments should have made
it clear that ventilation is not the only cure for vitiated air. It should
be regarded rather as a supplementary measure, to be used where other
means of sanitation can not or will not give sufficient relief. To ven-
tilate buildings with the impure air from city streets, railway cars with

3o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

smoke from the engines, subway cars with dust-laden air from the
tunnel, is naturally inefficient and of questionable benefit. Efficiency
in ventilation must come through wider streets and courts, cleaner
thoroughfares, the abolition of smoke and dust nuisances, and last, but
not least, through the design of buildings, engineering work, public
conveyances and their equipment on sanitary lines.

Laws have been in effect in several states which prescribe a fixed
amount of fresh air to be supplied per capita in schools and theaters.
These laws do not cover the standard of purity, except perhaps as ex-
pressed by the carbonic acid test, which does not measure the worst
forms of contamination. They do not always define temperature and
other qualities essential to secure its benefit to people. Moreover, it is
almost hopeless to enforce them in the proper spirit. Discretion might
often be in order where natural conditions will help, but can not be
conceded while the exact volume of artificial supply is prescribed. The
chief benefit of such legislation lies in its educational effect on people.
The urgent need to-day is to bring before the public again and again
the most objectionable causes of impure air, especially those of pre-
ventable nature, and to promote sound judgment as to the logical and
practical means of relief.

Ventilation can be effected by natural, artificial or mechanical
means. Each of these three methods has its field for application.
Natural ventilation is incidental to the design and construction of a
building. Frame houses are subject to considerable leakage through
the shrinking wood-work of walls, windows and doors and through their
greater exposure to the air generally. Such ventilation may also be
called spontaneous. It is generally sufficient in exposed wooden dwell-
ings, at times even greater than necessary. Brick and stone buildings
are also subject to more or less spontaneous ventilaton, which, however,
does not always meet the need. In such cases, the general design of
the building should be arranged deliberately to encourage a natural
ingress and egress of air. For residences and offices not unduly
crowded, this may suffice with a fair exposure, but often it should be
supplemented by artificial means. This implies that the building must
have certain features which induce a decided movement of air, such as
shafts leading from kitchen and inside rooms, also fire-place flues and
vents from special sources of odor. With such provisions an active
removal of foul air may be effected by differences of temperature, in-
creased possibly by waste heat available. The leading idea should be
to give the most advantageous direction to the natural currents of air.
Systematic supply of fresh air, combined in some form with the heating
apparatus, is appropriate in many cases, particularly as it permits some
control over the purity, temperature and humidity of the air entering
the building.

THE SANITATION OF AIR 31

Mechanical or forced ventilation finds application where the number
of people, excess of heat, or other conditions creating unwholesome
atmosphere, can not be overcome by any other method. Theaters and
crowded assembly halls, class rooms, hospitals, certain laboratories and
workshops, hotel kitchens, public smoking and toilet rooms, generally
need a rapid renewal of air. The ventilation of such places should be
positive, that is, it should not be dependent to any extent upon weather
or temporarily favorable conditions. Of course, when subject to spon-
taneous ventilation, such rooms will require less of the artificial kind.
Indeed, it is important always to utilize the natural means at hand,
and to omit none of the preventive measures that may help to relieve
the situation. Buildings should be designed with due regard to airing
and to avoid, if possible, the necessity for a mechanical system. The
latter should always be considered as a sort of emergency device and
reduced to the utmost simplicity consistent with the need. Of course,
simplicity must not be secured at the expense of quality or efficiency.
The latter depends mostly upon the purity, perfect distribution and the
control over the temperature of the air supply. Moderate volumes,
well applied, are better and more economical than large quantities
indifferently, indiscriminately, almost criminally introduced. When
designed and equipped on the right principles, buildings will be less
dependent upon the uncertainties of complex machinery, incompetence
or indifference of operators, parsimoniousness of owners, and all those
contigencies which so often have turned a well-intentioned, but too
complicated, apparatus into a dead letter, a lot of junk, or even a
nuisance and a menace to health, instead of a means of relief. The
undesirability of mechanical devices increases rapidly with their com-
plexity and age. Deterioration is bound to set in. The simplest
means to accomplish the end is not only the most economical, but it is
the best guarantee for successful operation in the long run.

Building Reform. — The extreme utilization of space which is the
common tendency in much of our urban architecture has passed the
sanitary danger line. There are too many investors, or speculators,
who do not care whether a structure is fit for habitation. Unfortu-
nately, architects do not always realize the meaning of the demands
put upon them, and that those exaggerated proportions, growing out
of the fight for light and air, will make sanitation more difficult and
are unfair to the neighbor. When building on a plot of ground, any
adjoining property should be given an equal chance for vertical expan-
sion, giving leave to any one to do unto you the same, with profit.
Some of the flagrant encroachments lately seen upon other men's right
to nature's freedom have really been nothing short of criminal. The
limitation of the sky scraper is really but a question of fair dealing
with one's neighbor.

32 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

The campaign for tenement-house reform, lately rewarded by
splendid results, has been a step in the right direction. Its bearing on
the building laws is one of the most important benefits. The provi-
sions calling for greater court area and other features calculated to
relieve crowding and to assist natural ventilation should be made even
more sweeping and extended to all classes of buildings.

To improve the housing, for rich and poor, and to make a city more
healthful generally, we must aim to relieve this excessive crowding.
A good beginning has been made by the fight for small parks. More
of these breathing spots are needed, sorely needed. Healthy play-
room for the children of those unbroken rows of flats is hard to ob-
tain, but it must be secured, if only to break up the monotony of
brick and stone and relieve it with some wholesome vegetation,
cooling, purifying bits of nature. Even if limited to a single block,
small parks could be utilized for schools, as is done frequently in
smaller towns. This would be really the ideal way of securing their
full benefit, the children profiting in the day, adults in the evening,
and the neighborhood all the time. The plan of locating public build-
ings and schools on open squares or parks may be luxury in country
towns, but it is a necessity in large cities from a sanitary point of view.
This idea, once recognized and rooted, might be the wedge for a new
method of securing sites, of making the school the excuse, or rather
the necessity, for another small park. It should at once be adopted in
outlying districts where space is less expensive. The finest sites set
apart for public institutions have never been found too good and always
will prove the best investment of public funds from every point of view.
It can not but influence the private owner to plan and build with a
broader purpose than the immediate commercial gain, which has
demoralized the arts and crafts, the architecture of the day, and will
be a testimony to future generations of the materialism of our age.

To bring daylight into the dwellings of the ignorant masses is to
educate them and to banish dirt, filth and disease. More light inci-
dentally brings more air and purer air. But there is need for sanitary
reform also in the dwellings of the rich. It should begin with more
sensible building plans, a return to simplicity in design and construc-
tion with a view to inducing salubrity as the first principle of hygiene.
It is not so much the quantity of air that is to be considered, but rather
the quality. Let us have not only more air, but purer air, as from the
open country or the sea. Sanitation of the air is a lesson taught by
nature. Civilization must apply it for humanity, for the wholesome
enjoyment of life to all.

THE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT

THE JEWS : A STUDY OF EACE AND ENVIRONMENT. IV.

By Dr. MAURICE FISHBERG

NEW YORK

Mortality
HHHE bulk of the Jewish population in the orient and eastern

Europe lives mostly in the oldest and most congested parts of

cities amid squalid and unsanitary surroundings, where the mortality
rates are, by general experience, known to be excessive. Physically,
the eastern European Jews appear to be weak, anemic and decrepit
when compared with the christian population, and in addition they are
mainly engaged in indoor occupations. These peculiarities would lead
one to expect a priori that the mortality rates among them would be
much higher than among other people, who live mostly under better
hygienic and sanitary conditions, have a large proportion of agricul-
turists who live in the open country, and are engaged in outdoor occu-
pations, and to all outward appearances are more robust and healthy.
It is a remarkable fact, however, that the contrary is true. The figures
in the appended table, giving the results of most recent official censuses

Country.

Year.

Annual Mortality per 1000.

Mortality of

Christians

100, Jews —

Jews.

Christians.

1901

1902
1895-1900

1901

1897

1903

1901
1901-1904

1904

1901

1903

1900

1902

20.58
20.02
19.70
18.22
17.82
17.29
17.26
14.80
14.22
13.32
13.26
13.20
12.27
12.11

23.14
29.06
35.90
24.59
36.49
27.24
25.18
19.10
20.44
17.12
20.02
19.00
17.44
23.08

88.93

Roumania

68.54

Cracow (Galicia) ...
Warsaw (Poland)...

64.00
74.09
48.81
63.47

65.93

77 48

Prussia

69.57

77.80

Prague

66.23

69.47

Amsterdam

Bavaria

70.36
52 47

in various countries, show that the rates are much lower among the
Jews than among other Europeans. Only in Algeria and Roumania
do the rates exceed twenty per 1,000 population, but in all the other
mentioned countries the annual rates are less than twenty: In Poland
(Cracow and Warsaw) it is between 18 and 19; in European Eussia,
Hungary and Austria, 17; in Prussia, 14; in the capitals of Prussia,
Bohemia and Hungary, only 13; and in Amsterdam and Bavaria the
low rates are almost unprecedented, only 12 per 1,000. A yet lower

34 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

mortality rate was found among 10,618 Jewish families, including
60,630 persons living in the United States December 31, 1889. In
the figures published in Census Bulletin No. 19 (Washington, December
30, 1890) it appears that the death rate was only 7.11 per 1,000, which
is but ' little more than half the annual death rate among other persons
of the same social class and conditions living in this country.'

The low death rates of the Jews are more strikingly demonstrated
when compared with the mortality of the christian population of the
countries in which they live. This is done in the fourth column of figures
in the table; the mortality of the non- Jewish population is taken as
100. It is seen that the Jewish death rate in Algeria is but 89 per
cent, of the mortality of the other Europeans in that country; in
Bavaria it is a little over, and in European Eussia even less than, fifty
per cent, of the christian mortality. In other words, the death rates
of the Jews are from eleven to fifty per cent, less than those of the
christians.

These favorable mortality rates of the Jews are not a recent phe-
nomenon. At all times when statistics on the subject were compiled
it was found to be the case. The censuses of Prussia give some very
interesting figures in this connection. The rates since 1820 were as
follows :

Average Annual Mortality per 1,000

Year Jews Christians

1820-66 20.40

1878-82 17.53 25.23

1888-92 15.71 23.26

1893-97 14.73 21.84

1900 14.96 21.70

1904 14.22 20.44

It is thus seen that the mortality in Prussia has been sinking in
recent years among both Jews and christians, decreasing by about
twenty per cent, since 1878 in both groups. This is of*course to be
attributed to advancement in economic, social, hygienic and sanitary
conditions. But it is remarkable that there is no change in the ratio
of Jewish to the christian mortality; it was in 1878 sixty-nine per cent.
of the mortality of the christian and remained the same in 1904.
Hungary is another country where reliable statistics are available for
fifteen years. The figures are as follows:

Deaths per 1,000

Year Jews Christians

1891-95 19.07 33.12

1896-1900 16.87 27.62

1901 16.95 25.94

1902 17.42 27.89

1903 17.29 27.24

Here it is to be noted that the mortality of the Jews was in 1891
more favorable than in 1903. The decrease during the last fifteen

THE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT 35

years was more marked among the christians: In 1891 the Jewish
mortality was 57.58 per cent, of the christian mortality, while in 1903
it was 63.47 per cent., which indicates that they are approaching the
mortality rates of their non-Jewish neighbors. Data for Warsaw,
Poland, show the same process: In 1882 the mortality was, Jews 24.48,
general population 32.34; in 1891, Jews 20.27, general population
23.05; 1896, Jews 20.42, general population 23.54; in 1901, Jews
18.22, general population 21.22. All this indicates that in recent years
the differences in the mortality between Jews and christians are being
obliterated.

Death is a biological phenomenon, and can not be influenced by
purely ethical or metaphysical factors, such as, for instance, religion,
when Jews are compared with christians. Differences in religion are
consequently not sufficient to explain the differences in the mortality
rates between Jews and non-Jews. Nor can racial affinities explain
completely the low mortality of the Jews, because physically the Jews
bear a striking resemblance to the non-Jewish races and peoples among
whom they live, and also because the differences in the rates are too
large in each country to admit racial uniformity. A study of differ-
ences in social and economic conditions is more fruitful of results.
Thus, in Budapest the death rate of the Jews was only 69.47 per cent,
of that of the christians. But, as is aptly pointed out by Korosi, ac-
cording to the census of 1891, out of every 1,000 inhabitants there were
common laborers, among the catholics 118, among the Lutherans 125,
among the Jews only 67; domestic servants were found, among 1,000
catholics 95, Lutherans 98, and among the Jews only 17; merchants
were found, among 1,000 catholics 20, Lutherans 36, while among the
Jews the figure was 131. These social differences are of sufficient im-
portance to greatly influence the death rates and to account for the
favorable showing made by the Jews. As is well known, certain occu-
pations are more deadly than others. When to this are added other
social factors which differentiate the Jews from the christians, such as
the rarity of alcoholism and illegitimacy among the former, and the
proverbial care bestowed by them on their offspring, thus contributing
to a low infant mortality, the effects of the social factors become
apparent.

Infant Mortality
All this is depicted in a striking manner when infantile mortality
among Jews is considered. It appears, namely, from all available data
that the Jews do not have the advantage over others when deaths of
adults, particularly persons over fifty, are compared. It is only during
infancy and childhood that fewer deaths occur among them. In
Prussia, where the mortality rates are classified in the census reports

36 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

according to the age of the individual whether he is less than or over
fifteen years old, we find that the mortality of the young is less than
one half that of the christians. In 1904 48.89 per cent, of all the
deaths among christians in that country occurred in individuals less
than fifteen years of age, while among the Jews only 19.78 per cent,
of all deaths were in persons of these ages. In Berlin it was in 1904,
christians 42.05 and Jews 20.28, also less than one half among the
Jews. In Amsterdam the deaths recorded in 1900 were distributed
by ages as follows:

Age Christians Jews

— 1 25.23 per cent. 18.76 per cent.

1-13 15.68 per cent. 11.72 per cent.

13-64 33.58 per cent. 33.38 per cent.

64 -f- 25.51 per cent. 36.14 per cent.

Here also the mortality during infancy and childhood was smaller
among the Jews than among the christians; between the ages of 13
to 64 it was equal among both classes, while among the old it was more
frequent among the Jews. The same condition has been found in
Hungary, where the mortality of children below seven years of age is
49.5 per cent, among the christian population, and only 43.69 per cent,
among the Jews.

Objections may be raised against this method of calculating the
mortality of children, because it must first be ascertained whether the
distribution of the population by age classes is the same in both groups.
This is particularly the case with the Jews, whose birth rates are lower
than those of christians. A smaller number of births means a smaller
number of infants, and consequently a smaller number of deaths. The
best way to compare the mortality of Jews and christians is to calcu-
late the proportion of deaths per 1,000 persons at each age period, i. e.,
to ascertain the death rates at each age in both classes, Jews and chris-
tians. But this is difficult because there are no available data pub-
lished in census reports. The exact infantile mortality is, however, easily
ascertained by finding the ratio of deaths of infants below one year old
to the number of births in a given year (excluding still-births). In
the following table are given some figures about the infant mortality
in some European countries:

Deaths of Infants per 1,000 Births
Country Jews Christians

Amsterdam (1900) 92.77 139.56

European Russia ( 1897 ) 150.80 274.30

Cracow ( 1894-97 ) 155.47 170.84

Hungary ( 1902) 95.20 164.60

Here also a lower infant mortality is seen among the Jews. Of
1,000 Jewish children born among the Jews in Amsterdam during 1900,

THE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT 37

907 survived the first year, while among the christians in that city
only 861 survived; in Eussia the figures stand, Jews 849, christians
726; and in Cracow, Jews 845 and christians 829. This has a great
bearing on the expectation of life of the Jews. According to the cal-
culations presented in Census Bulletin No. 19, 1890, the expectation
of life of the Jews is much more favorable than that of the christian
population of the United States. Assuming 100,000 Jewish indi-
viduals to have been born on the same day (among which there would
probably be 50,684 males and 49,316 females), 45,680 males and 44,995
females will survive the first year; 41,731 males and 42,326 females
will survive the fifth year, etc. At the end of about 71 years one half
of them will be dead. Taking the data for Massachusetts for 1878-82,
of 100,000 American infants born (among which there would probably
be 51,253 males and 48,747 females) only 41,986 males and 41,310
females would survive the first year; 36,727 males and 36,361 females
would survive the fifth year; and half of them would be dead at the
end of about 47 years.

While these figures are open to criticism because, as has been
pointed out by Hoffman, the method adopted for the calculation of the
life-tables is not stated in detail, still it may be stated without any
hesitation that the longevity of the Jews in the United States and
Europe is superior to that of the non-Jewish population. There is
also no doubt that this superiority is mainly due to the lower mortality
during infancy and childhood. It is doubtful whether there are any
differences in mortality rates during adolescence and middle life be-
tween Jews and christians. Among persons of advanced age, over fifty,
the rates are higher among the Jews, simply because a larger number
reach that age.

The lower mortality of Jewish infants is not due to any special
inherent vitality, but finds its explanation in certain social causes:
Jewesses in eastern Europe almost invariably nurse their infants at
the breast, and it is rare to find among them an infant brought up on
artificial feeding. The mortality of breast-fed children is much below
that of hand-fed. Jewish mothers only rarely go to work after mar-
riage, and can therefore bestow all possible care on their infants, which
can not be said to be invariably true among the poorer classes of popu-
lation in eastern Europe and America. In western Europe the Jews
are economically on a higher plane than the general population, and
when infant mortality is discussed it must be recalled that it is much
smaller among the well-to-do than among the poor. The Jews should
be compared with the wealthier classes of western Europe and not with
the general population. To these social factors there must also be
added the fact that the birth rates of the Jews are lower than those
among the christians. A high mortality can not be expected when
fewer children are born. In fact, in Eussia, where the birth rate of

vol. xxx. — 3.

38 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the Jews is high (compared with conditions among western European
Jews), the infant mortality is also higher, though not so high as the
mortality of the Greek orthodox, whose birth rates are the highest in
Europe.

Arthur Euppin, who has studied the problem thoroughly, insists
that the superiority of the expectation of life of the Jews is mainly
due to the higher infant mortality among christians, which drags down
the average duration of life. " To use a coarse example : The expecta-
tion of life of a christian child on the day of its birth is, roughly stated,
about forty years, as against sixty years of the Jewish child; at the
tenth birthday the probable duration of life of the christian child is
fifty-five, while that of the Jewish child is sixty-five; and at the
twentieth birthday the probable duration of life is, for both, seventy
years, i. e., the expectation of life of the christian is equal to that of
the Jew as soon as the christian has passed his years of infancy and
childhood, and reached adolescence."

" The best illustration," Euppin goes on to say, " of this condition,
is perhaps to be seen when we take definite statistical data of a given
city, say Budapest, Hungary. The mortality during 1902 was 14.17
per 1,000 among the Jews, and 21.81 among the christians. The Jews
were favored by the following factors :

1. A Low Infantile Mortality. — The proportion of death of infants under
one year was during that year 9.52 per cent, of all the births from Jewish
mothers and 16.46 per cent, of all the births from christian mothers. If the
infant mortality was as high among the Jews as among the christians the
number of Jews who died during that year would have been larger by 320, and
through that the mortality would have been increased by 1.89, i. e., the death
rate would have been 16.06 instead of 14.17.

2. The Lower Birth Rate of the Jews. — The birth rate per 1,000 population
was, namely, 27.29 among the Jews and 32.74 among the christians. If the
Jews had relatively as many births as the christians had, the mortality rate,
on the basis of the Jewish infant mortality just determined above, would have
been larger by 0.48 per 1,000; their general death rate would have been in-
creased to 16.54 from 16.06.

3. The Smaller Mortality of Children under Ten Years of Age (excepting
Infants under One Year). — The proportion of deaths of children between one
and ten years old was 2.15 per 1,000 among the Jews and 3.73 among the
christians. If the Jewish mortality at these ages were as high as that of the
christians, 266 more Jews would have died during that year, and the general
mortality rates would have increased by 1.57 per 1,000, or instead of 16.54 it
would have been 18.11.

In this manner one half of the difference in death rates between
Jews and christians in Budapest is wiped out. It stands now as 18.11
for Jews, and 21.81 for christians. The remaining difference in the
rates of 3.7 per 1,000 in favor of the Jews, can also be accounted for
by other social factors, and no special physiological tenacity of life
of the Jews need be considered as the cause. One has only to recall
that alcoholism is very rare among the Jews, and that the Sabbath

TEE JEWS: BACE AND ENVIRONMENT 39

is a day of rest among the orthodox Jews in eastern Europe, and not
of drink and dissipation, to find a reason for greater immunity to cer-
tain diseases, and to a lesser liability to accidental death. Their occupa-
tions also are mainly of the kind in which violent or accidental deaths
are not of frequent occurrence. There are, relatively, very few Jews
engaged in shipping, mining and dangerous trades generally. The
deleterious effects of the indoor occupations in which the Jews are
largely employed are mostly manifesting themselves in the anemia and
poor physique which are characteristic of them. But, on the other hand,
they are rarely exposed to the inclemencies of the weather, and thus
acute articular rheumatism, pneumonia, etc., are less often a cause of
death among them than among others. In fact, diseases of the respira-
tory organs, including tuberculosis, have been observed to be less com-
monly a cause of death among the Jews in Eussia, Hungary, Austria,
England and America.1 Their partial immunity to consumption is
astonishing, considering that they are mostly engaged at indoor occupa-
tions, working long hours in unhealthy sweatshops, and living in the
most congested parts of the cities. Perhaps a good explanation may
be found in the confined Ghetto life in which they have been compelled
to live for centuries, and which has adapted their organism to indoor
life much better than other civilized peoples, who have a large propor-
tion of agriculturists and outdoor workers. During the long years
of Ghetto life most of those whose organism could not adapt itself to
the confined atmosphere succumbed and were thus eliminated. It is a
general observation that races that are not adapted to indoor life
quickly succumb to consumption as soon as they attempt to live in
modern dwellings. Among the uncultured ' blanket ' Indians of our
western plains, and among the Indians of Peru, the Khirgiz Tartars
and other savage tribes of Africa and Australia, all of which live out-
doors, the disease is almost unknown. But as soon as the same people
are taken to modern cities, they can not stand it, but soon contract
various diseases common in large cities, particularly tuberculosis. They
have not had the opportunity to slowly adapt themselves to an indoor
existence, as was the case with the Jews.

Suicide
That purely social factors are the underlying cause of the low
mortality rates of the Jews, and that with changes in their social con-
ditions there occur also changes in the death rates, are well illustrated
by the frequency of suicide among them. Statistics collected by
Morselli (' Suicide,' p. 122) show that during the third quarter of the
last century Jews only rarely committed suicide. He attributes it
partly to racial, and partly to religious influences, and maintains that
individuals fervently devoted to religion, especially women (nuns and

1 See ' The Relative Infrequeney of Tuberculosis among Jews,' by the author,
in American Medicine, November 2, 1901.

4o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

lay sisters) furnish very few suicides. A study of more recent sta-
tistics about the Jews confirms this view. In eastern Europe and the
orient, where they are ardently devoted to their religion, a Jewish
suicide is very rare; in some cities in Russia or Galicia, with over 20,000
Jews, more than ten years often pass without a Jew taking his own
life. During the first half of the last century, when the social and
economic condition of the Jews in western Europe was not much
superior to that of their eastern European coreligionists of to-day, self-
destruction was also rare among them. With the decline of the in-
tensity of religious belief which is characteristic of the contemporaneous
Jews in western Europe and America an adoption of the habits and
customs of the christian population has been noted, among which sui-
cide may be mentioned as a social fact important for study.

In eastern Europe suicide is even to-day less frequent among the
Jewish than among the christian population. In Cracow, for instance,
one per cent, of all the deaths during 1895-1900 was self-inflicted
among the christians, as against only 0.4 per cent, among the Jews;
in Budapest, Hungary, the rates in 1902 were as follows:

Number of Suicides pee 1,000 Population

Christians Jews

Men 6.79 4.61

Women 2.35 1.00

Total 4.44 2.88

Suicide is here less frequent among the Jews than among others.
But proceeding to western Europe, where the Jews are affected
by what Morselli characterizes as the ' universal and complex influence
to which we give the name civilization/ the proportion of suicides is
at present much larger among the Jews than among christians, although
but fifty years ago it was uncommon. Thus in Wurtemberg during
1846-60 the rate was on the average annually among protestants
113.5, among catholics 77.9, and among Jews only 65.6 per 1,000,000
population. During 1898-1902 the rates increased to 252 among the
Jews and to only 162.7 among the christians. In Bavaria the suicide
rates were during 1844-56, Jews 105.9, protestants 135.4 and cath-
olics 49.1 per 1,000,000. Since 1870 a steady increase was noted as
follows :

Number of Suicides per 1,000,000 Population

Catholics Protestants Jews

1870-79 73.5 194.6 115.3

1880-89 95.3 221.7 185.8

1890-99 92.7 210.2 212.4

The increase in the rates of self-destruction among the Jews has
thus been so pronounced within the thirty years since 1870 that it is
now much higher than among the christian population of Bavaria.
The greatest increase has, however, been observed in Prussia. During

THE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT 41

1849-55 it was rare among them, only 46.4 per million Jews, as against
49.6 among catholics, and 159.9 among protestants. It so increased
in frequency that during 1869-72 it was, Jews 96, catholics 69 and
protestants 187; and the increase during the following years was so
severe that the Jews outstripped the christians during 1892-1901.

Rates of Suicide pee 1,000,000 Population

Men Women

Jews 370.4 124.1

Christians 321.5 81.1

All these figures show conclusively that the rates of suicide among
the Jews are not at all influenced by ethnic factors. The social en-
vironment is solely responsible for the infrequency of self-destruction
among the Jews in eastern Europe, where they live in strict adherence
to their faith and traditions; while in western Europe, where they co-
mingle with their christian neighbors, adopting their habits and customs,
the rates of suicide increase. Considering that there is a lesser number
of children among the Jews, and that suicide is rare among the young,
and that they are mostly town dwellers, engaged in mercantile and finan-
cial pursuits, there is good reason for the higher rates among them
than among others. Further proof of the influence of environment
is adduced by the fact that with a change of environment there is
also a perceptible change in the suicide rates. The Jewish immigrants
in New York city are much given to self-destruction, although in their
native homes suicide is very rare. There are no available statistics as
to the exact annual number of Jewish suicides in New York city, but
an inquiry by Mr. John Paley, editor of a Yiddish daily, elicited
the following information : " About fifteen years ago suicide was un-
common among the immigrant Jews, so much so that I always gave
each case reported a prominent place in my paper. To-day conditions
have changed. There are so many cases of Jewish suicides that unless
it is a prominent person, or there are special news features connected
with the case, I do not at all mention it in the columns of my daily."
He estimates that there are six Jewish suicides on the average weekly
in New York City. If this figure is near the truth, and I am inclined
to believe it is, then the suicide rate among the Jews in New York
is appalling. The aversion to self-destruction of the eastern European
Jew is thus seen not to be racial. As soon as he is brought face to
face with a more complex life in New York City, as soon as his devotion
to his religion is more or less dwindling, any serious reverse in life is
liable to discourage him to the extent of causing him to terminate his
existence.

IV. Natural Increase of Population

From the preceding studies it was evident that the birth, marriage
and death rates were everywhere in Europe lower among the Jews than

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

among their non-Jewish neighbors. It is of importance now to in-
quire what are the effects of these low rates on the increase of the
Jewish population. Population increases, as is well known, by the
excess of the number of births over deaths, and it is important to in-
quire whether the small birth rates of the Jews are everywhere com-
pensated by the low death rates, or whether even their low mortality is
insufficient to leave a substantial surplus because the number of births
is so small as to be insufficient to replace those lost annually by deaths.

In general terms it can be stated that there are two ways by which
a population may replace its losses by deaths : First, by a high birth
rate much in excess of the death rate. This is usually the rule in com-
munities in a low state of culture, among agricultural classes, and also
among the poorer and laboring classes in European and American
industrial centers. The death rate, especially the infant mortality,
is very high, but this is compensated by early marriages, and a sub-
stantial prolificacy. On the whole, the average duration of life is, in
such communities, comparatively short ; the population is being renewed
at frequent intervals.

Communities in a higher state of culture, on the other hand, have
generally lower birth, marriage and death rates, particularly the infant
mortality is more favorable. It requires a longer period of time for
such a community to renew its population, because the average duration
of life is superior. This is observed generally among the upper ten
thousand of modern civilized states, particularly in large cities. From
a sociological and economic standpoint this method of perpetuation
of the population, if kept within certain limits, has its advantages
over the former method. To use Spencer's terminology, it decreases
the expenditure on genesis, leaving sufficient for individual evolution.
In other words, the smaller the number of children born has as a con-
comitant a smaller infant mortality, and also gives the parents an
opportunity to raise their offspring on a more desirable standard.

A glance at the figures brought together in the preceding studies
shows that the Jews, judged by the social and economic environment
in which we found them, can be placed in either one of the mentioned
classes of fertility. To begin with the natural increase, i. e., the an-
nual excess of births over deaths per 1,000 population, it is found that
there are great differences between eastern and western European Jews.

Country.

Excess of Births
Over Deaths.

Country.

Excess of Births
Over Deaths.

Jews.

Christians.

Jews.

Christians.

Algeria (1901)

24.09
17.70
17.61
16.63
14.90
12.34

9.43
1.30
16.87
11.83
10.68
13.80

Prague (1901)

Berlin (1904)

2.59
3.70
4.49
4.60
4.70

11.29

Cracow (1899)

European Russia (1897)..
Austria (1901)

10.24

Prussia (1904)

16.49

Bavaria (1900)

12.60

Hungary (1903)

Hesse (1901-1904)

14.90

Eoumania (1902)

TEE JEWS: FACE AND ENVIRONMENT 43

In the former the excess is large, while in the latter it is small. This
is seen from the table given above.

In Algeria, the only oriental country where vital statistics of the
Jews are published, the natural increase is very great. The social
conditions of the native Jews in that country are purely oriental.
Early marriages are the rule, and celibacy almost unknown. This
brings about a high rate of fertility; their birth rate was 44.67 per
3,000, with a correspondingly high mortality rate of 20.58. But after
all the excess of births over deaths is large, reaching annually 24.09
per 1,000. In European Eussia, where social conditions of the Jews
are more occidental, the excess of births is smaller, only 17.61; in
Austria, 16.63 ; in Hungary, 14.90, and in Eoumania, 12.34. All these
eastern European Jews show rates of natural increase characteristic of
eastern people. Proceeding to western Europe we find a different con-
dition of affairs. The rates of proliferation are low, owing to the low
marriage and birth rates; even their favorable mortality rates are in-
sufficient to leave a substantial excess of births over deaths. Thus in
Bavaria the natural increase was during 1900 only 4.60, while among
the non-Jewish population it was nearly three times as large, 12.6; in
Prussia the natural increase was in 1904, Jews 4.49, and christians
16.4; in cities it is even lower, only 3.70 in Berlin (10.24 among chris-
tians) and in Prague 2.59 (11.29 among christians). The influence of
social and economic conditions on the natural increase of the Jews is
well displayed in the various provinces of the Austrian Empire. In
Galicia, where the majority of the Jews live in poverty and want, and
are rigidly devoted to their religion, the natural increase was during
100, 17.92 per 1,000 (christians, 16.61) ; in Bukowina, where condi-
tions are about the same, it was 12.66 (christians,15.83) ; but in Lower
Austria where their social, intellectual and economic conditions are
much superior, it was only 7.69, while in Bohemia, where the majority
of the Jews are well-to-do and are socially comparable with the western
European Jews, the natural increase is very low, lower even than in
Berlin, only 1.35 per 1,000 (christians, 10.76). There are good rea-
sons to believe that in Italy, France, England and the United States,
the same conditions prevail among the native Jews.

These conditions are only a recent phenomenon among the Jews
in western Europe. During the first half of the nineteenth century
the excess of births over deaths was equal, and even superior to that
of the christians. In Prussia, for instance, the average annual birth
rate during 1822-40 was 35.46; the death rate, 21.44; leaving an
excess of births over deaths of 14.02 per 1,000, as against only 10.40
among the christian population (births 40.01 and deaths 29.61). This
excess began to sink gradually but regularly, as can be seen from the
following figures :

44 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Excess of Bieths ovee Deaths

Jews Christians

1885 10.33 12.29

1890 7.64 12.58

1895 6.66 15.12

1900 4.52 14.57

1904 4.49 16.49

Similar conditions are observed in Bavaria, where the natural in-
crease was larger among the Jews than among the christians in 1876,
when a decline began to be noted among both groups, but with a much
greater severity among the Jews than among the christians.

Jews Christians

1876 15.8 14.1

1880 12.9 10.8

1885 9.9 10.0

1890 6.0 8.8

1895 4.8 12.4

1900 4.6 12.6

The excess of births over deaths among the Jews has thus dwindled
tc less than one third in Prussia since 1822, and in Bavaria to a little
over one third since 1876. This decline in the natural increase of the
Jews is not only characteristic of western European Jews, but is also
beginning to be noted in eastern Europe. In Hungary, where the rate
was among the non- Jewish population only 9.69 during 1891-95, and
with slight fluctuations rose to 10.68 in 1903, the tendency among
the Jews was decidedly in the opposite direction. It was 17.79 during
1891-1895, and sank to 16.07 in 1901 and even to 14.90 in 1903. The
same conditions are observed among Jews in other European countries.

V. Summary and Conclusions
The demographic facts presented in the preceding studies lead to
but one generalization: The birth, marriage and death rates of the
Jews may be taken as an index of their social, economic and intel-
lectual conditions. Wherever they are isolated by hostile legislation,
compelled to live apart from the general population, confined in
Ghettos, thus deprived of every opportunity to enter into intimate
social intercourse with christians; wherever, largely as a result of this
isolation, they are on a low economic and intellectual standard, their
birth and marriage rates are high, their death rates, particularly the
infant mortality, correspondingly high, and practically no intermar-
riage with christians takes place. Hostile legislation against the Jews
is shown, by the evidence presented above, to utterly fail in its aims.
Eepression of the Jews in countries like Eussia has mainly one object
in view: To make their life so miserable and unbearable as to induce
them to adopt Christianity, which removes all disabilities. How far
this policy fails in its aims can be seen from the fact that conversions

TEE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT 45

of Jews to Christianity are comparatively rare in Russia and Roumania,
while, in common with all others who are on a low social and economic
level, their natural increase, i. e., the excess of births over deaths is
enormous among them. They increase in number in spite of the
attempt to check them. This is substantiated by the statistical evi-
dence gathered from the censuses of Russia, Roumania, Poland, Ga-
licia, etc.

On the other hand, in western Europe, in Germany, Italy, France,
England and in America, where the Jews are enjoying civil liberty on
an equal basis with the general population, and where they are, as a
result, on a superior plane socially, intellectually and economically,
their birth and marriage rates are so low, that even with phenomenally
low death rates there is left a very small excess of births over deaths,
in fact they show a striking retrogression and decadence. This deca-
dence is by no means accidental, but can be traced as due to the re-
markable development they have been undergoing during the last
seventy-five years, and also to the social intercourse with gentiles which
in addition also brings about mixed marriages. The children born to
these mixed couples are lost to the Jews, less than twenty-five per cent,
and there is good reason to believe that hardly more than ten per cent,
remain Jews, while the rest is net gain to Christianity. On the whole,
the native Jews in western Europe and America are being decimated
by a low birth rate, and absorbed by intermarriage with christians.
Any increase in their number is due to immigration from eastern
Europe.

The demographic facts presented by the Jews may also be taken as
an index of their religious status. In the orient and in eastern Europe,
where the devotion to their faith is intense, they have high birth rates,
early marriages, substantial excess of births over deaths, and no inter-
marriages with christians occur. In western Europe and in America
conditions are different and go hand in hand with an evident lessened
intensity of faith, often amounting to religious indifference. In fact,
the cruel persecutions and massacres to which they were exposed
during the last two thousand years have not robbed the Jews of as
large a proportion of adherents as modern emancipation with its con-
comitant adaptation of the habits and customs of modern civilized life.
To take Russia as an example. There the Jews are oppressed mainly
with one aim in view: to gain them for the Greek orthodox church.
As soon as he adopts Christianity, the Jew, besides receiving a bonus
of thirty silver roubles, is also given all the rights enjoyed by the chris-
tian population. But notwithstanding all these tempting advantages
offered, less than 90,000 Jews were converted during the nineteenth
century. In contrast with this may be taken Prussia, where the num-
ber of Jews is only 392,322 (1900) as against about 5,500,000 in

46 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Russia. Here, according to J. de la Roi, as many as 13,128 Jews have
been directly converted to Christianity during the nineteenth century,
and since mixed marriages were legalized in 1875, 10,160 Jews married
christians; in Russia no such marriages have taken place, except of
those who adopted Christianity and are included among the converts.
In Russia the birth rate was 35.43 in 1897, not much lower than in
the beginning of the last century. On the other hand, in Prussia the
rates were high in 1822-40 — 35.46 — but kept on sinking since their
emancipation, reaching 18.71 in 1904. In other words, if the Jews in
Prussia had remained in their original civil condition, unaffected by
modern conditions of life, they would have maintained their birth rates
as the Jews in Russia, and the number of children born during 1904
would have been about 13,000 instead of 6,913, as was the case. During
the thirty years, 1875-1904, there occurred altogether 267,775 births
by Jewish mothers in Prussia. If they had maintained their birth
rates at 35 per 1,000, the number born would have been about 385,000
during that period. The decline in fertility has consequently caused
a loss of 117,000 to the Jews, and if to this are added the large number
of conversions and of mixed marriages, which have taken place in that
country during these thirty years, it is evident that the total loss sus-
tained by Judaism was larger in Prussia where there are less than
400,000 Jews, than among the 5,500,000 Jews in Russia during the
entire nineteenth century.

The results of these conditions are seen when the relative number
of Jews in Germany is considered. In 1861 there were 138 Jews to
10,000 christians; in 1900 the number sank to 114, and the last census
taken in 1905 shows another decrease — there are only 109.8 Jews to
10,000 christians. The same has been the case with the Jews in other
German provinces, excepting Saxony:

Number of Jews pee 10,000 Christians

1870 1900

Germany 125 104

Prussia 133 114

Wiirtemberg 67 55

Bavaria 104 89

Baden 176 140

Hessen 297 219

Saxony 13 30

Although there was a large emigration of Germans who left for
America and for German colonies, still there was an enormous increase
of population in that country. In contrast with this increase are
the Jews in that country: although very few emigrated within the
last thirty years, and many Jews from other countries have immigrated
to Germany, still they have not kept pace with the general increase of

THE JEWS: RACE AND ENVIRONMENT 47

population, and in fact show a relative decrease in number. And
judging by the fact that the birth and marriage rates keep on de-
creasing, while the mixed marriages and conversions to Christianity
keep on increasing in number, as was shown in the preceding articles,
the future of Judaism in Germany is, to put it mildly, not very bright.
The same process of decadence is observed among the Jews in Italy,
France, England, America, etc., in varying degrees of intensity. If
immigration of Jews from eastern Europe should for some reason
cease, the number of native Jews in these countries would dwindle
away at a rate appalling to those who have the interests of their faith
at heart. In the United States the original Jewish settlers, the Spanish
and Portuguese Jews of the seventeenth, eighteenth and the first half
of the nineteenth centuries who refrained from intermarriage with
their German and Polish coreligionists, have practically disappeared;
very few of them have been left. The Jews are thus paying a high
price for their liberty and equality — self-effacement.

Another important conclusion we arrive at while studying the
above facts and figures is that most of the demographic phenomena
are not rooted in ethnic causes. The high rates of proliferation, the
exclusiveness of the Jews manifesting itself in part by endogamy, the
alleged excessive proportion of male births, the rates of suicide, etc.,
were all attributed to racial influences, to ' Semitic ' characteristics.
This opinion has its origin in the observations on Jews made during
the eighteenth and first half of the nineteenth centuries, when the
Jews all over Europe were a homogeneous social mass, all to the same
extent abused, persecuted and confined in Ghettos. Uniformity of
social conditions brought about uniform demographic phenomena,
which were considered racial traits. But the emancipation of the
Jews in western European countries, releasing them from isolation,
bringing them into intimate contact with their non-Jewish neighbors,
has completely transformed them. Eacial traits are not to be oblit-
erated by a change of milieu during a comparatively short period of
fifty or one hundred years, nor do they show such wide limits of varia-
tion as is displayed by the Jews in different countries. There are to-day
more pronounced differences between the Jews in Prussian Poland and
Eussian Poland than between Prussian and Italian Jews, although
but one hundred years ago the Prussian and Polish Jews were demo-
graphically on the same level. The part of Poland which was taken
by Prussia with its liberal government has given the Jews an oppor-
tunity to assimilate with the christian population, while in the part
of that country taken by Eussia they were compelled to live isolated
from the general population and they remained backward.

The demographic phenomena of the Jews are rooted in the social,
economic and intellectual conditions in which they find themselves.

48 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE

SERVICE. III.

By FRED De LAND

PITTSBURG, PA.

VI. First Commercial Telephone Exchange
n^HE first commercial telephone exchange system in the world was
-■- opened in New Haven, in January, 1878, and has been in con-
tinuous operation ever since. This pioneer exchange was organized by
Mr. George W. Coy, who now resides in Milford, New Haven County,
and who, during the twelve years ending with the year 1877, was
managing the local offices of the Atlantic and Pacific and the Franklin
Telegraph companies.

In July, 1877, the local papers in New Haven contained an adver-
tisement of ' Bell's telephone ' reading in part :

The proprietors keep the instrument in repair, without charge, and the user
has no expense except the maintenance of the line. It needs only a wire between
the two stations, though ten or twenty miles apart, with a telephone at each
end. . . . The outside of the telephone is of mahogany finely polished and an
ornament to any room or office. Telephones leased and lines constructed.

In September, 1877, Mr. Coy secured several Bell telephones and
installed a few private lines in New Haven, and also displaced some
district call-boxes with telephones in his local messenger service. Per-
ceiving how useful the telephone was proving to business houses de-
siring his messenger service, Mr. Coy concluded that a central telephone
exchange system would be a desirable thing for the community, pro-
vided a sufficient number of subscribers could be secured.

Now in the beginning of the evolution of telephone exchanges,
there was neither experience nor knowledge to guide the investor or
the manager. There were no known methods of operation or of main-
tenance to render uniform and no equipment to standardize, because
the to-be equipment had yet to be evolved from needs then unknown.
The Bell company had no factory and supplied only the hand tele-
phones, which were made to order under contract. Thus each licensee
was largely thrown on his own resources and compelled to devise much
of his exchange equipment and to secure from several different sources
such associated apparatus as was available. Then the installation was
necessarily made and the lines run with the aid of the telegraphers of
that day. For in 1877-8, the only ' electricians ' were the men asso-
ciated with the telegraph companies. The electric light and the trolley
then had no commercial existence. Thus, through the needs of the
telephone exchange, was evolved that now very essential person the

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE 49

' telephone engineer.' That is why Mr. Coy had not only to plan his
own central exchange system, but also to devise the necessary switching
mechanism for his central office.

Confiding his plan to his friend, Herrick P. Frost, the latter agreed
to assist Mr. Coy. Not that Mr. Frost knew aught about the telephone
or telegraph, but because he wanted to make a place for his son, then
about sixteen. Neither Coy nor Frost could spare the funds necessary
to build the exchange system, so Mr. Frost borrowed six hundred dol-
lars from his brother-in-law, Walter Lewis, organized the New Haven
District Telephone Company, secured a charter, and issued capital
stock having a par value of five thousand dollars. Of this amount
Coy and Frost subscribed for $2,000 each and $1,000 was transferred
in November, 1877, to the parent Bell company for a license granting
the exclusive right to use Bell telephones in the counties of New
Haven and Middlesex, in Connecticut. Mr. Coy states that later this
block of stock given to the Bell Company was repurchased by the
treasurer of the company for two hundred dollars in cash.

By virtue of his services as the good angel so essential in pioneer
undertakings, Walter Lewis was elected to the presidency of the com-
pany, Mr. Frost was made treasurer and Mr. Coy filled all the other
offices. Morris F. Tyler was the company's attorney, secured its char-
ter, obtained the necessary additional loans to enable extensions and
improvements to be made, took his pay in stock, and later became the
head of the organization. Incidentally it may be added that on May
31, 1878, Mr. Frost secured exclusive licenses to use telephones under
Bell patents for the term of ten years, in the cities of New Haven,
Hartford, Meriden, Middletown and New Britain, in Connecticut, and
of Springfield in Massachusetts, subject to his leasing not less than five
hundred telephones the first year, and expending not less than $8,000,
including the amount already expended in New Haven.

Being ready to proceed with the installation of its ' telephone-call
system,' Mr. Coy mailed to the prominent citizens of New Haven a
thousand copies of a circular describing the many advantages the sys-
tem would offer, and earnestly requesting subscriptions for the service.
It was expected that at least fifty replies would be received, but only
one subscription was obtained, and to the late Eev. John E. Todd,
pastor of the Church of the Eedeemer, belongs the honor of being the
first person in the world to subscribe for the service of a commercial
telephone exchange system. Quite rightfully Mr. Todd's name headed
the first list of telephone subscribers ever issued.

So complete a failure to arouse public interest in the telephone
system was a bitter disappointment to Mr. Coy. But being a born
hustler, he immediately sent out a competent canvasser to solicit con-
tracts. This agent succeeded in ultimately securing over two hundred

50 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

contracts, for which he was paid a commission of one dollar each. The
first contract thus secured was that of the New Haven Flour Company
for five telephones, including one in each of its stores and one in the
residence of its manager, Mr. George E. Thompson.

Mr. Coy commenced installing the telephones in November and it
was his intention to have had his exchange in operation early in De-
cember, 1877, but so numerous were the mechanical difficulties that
had to be overcome, so many electrical problems required solving, and
so slow were the shipments of telephones, that it was not until Jan-
uary 28, 1878, that the exchange was formally opened, the first service
being given on January 21, to about thirty subscribers.

Following the formal opening, the number of subscribers increased
rapidly, and on February 21, 1878, appeared the first regular list of
subscribers to a commercial telephone exchange. Fifty stations were
listed. The second list appeared on March 9, 1878, less than three
weeks after the first, and recorded about one hundred and twenty-five
stations. On April 8, 1878, came the third list with two hundred and
twenty-seven subscribers, including forty-two residences. Thencefor-
ward there was a steady growth. In all these lists names only were
shown. Numbering the subscribers to facilitate rapidity in securing
connections was an afterthought. Even so late as April, 1880, and
in so important a city as New York, the list of subscribers contained
no telephone numbers, though there were about one thousand five hun-
dred names distributed through six exchanges.

The rates established by Mr. Coy were only eighteen dollars a year
for a telephone in either the office or the house. But it should be borne
in mind that the circuits were of single iron wire and grounded, and
that from ten to sixteen subscribers were on a line, a number that
would not be tolerated in modern business service. Like many modern
telephone men, Mr. Coy did not base his rates on what he thought the
service was likely to cost him, for the eighteen-dollar rate was estab-
lished before a pole had been erected, but on what he thought the
public would pay. In January, 1877, the American District Telegraph
Company introduced a rate of eighteen dollars a year for its call-box
system in New Haven and cities of similar size, while it charged thirty
dollars a year in the large cities. So Mr. Coy concluded he could sup-
ply a telephone as cheaply as a district-box could be furnished; and
that is how the eighteen-dollar rate came to be established. Thus, as
early as February, 1878, Mr. Coy was advertising in the local papers
that ' the company rents them at the extremely low price of five cents
per day, thereby placing telephones within the reach of all/ And on
February 14 it was stated that Mr. Coy was ' supplying telephones in
any part of the city, including service to Fair Haven and Westville
(separate boroughs, one four miles, the other seven miles distant) for

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE 51

eighteen dollars per annum.' And it may be added that the gross
receipts of the New Haven exchange in the month of February, 1878,
were $250.

Mr. Coy was a great believer in press publicity and made liberal
use of the advertising pages of the local papers, thus keeping the public
informed concerning all extensions and repairs. In those days the
weather reports issued by the United States Signal Service were very
desirable. So Mr. Coy placed a telephone in the office of the weather
observer, and on March 15, 1878, advertised that 'any one having a
telephone can make inquiries as to the weather, temperature, barometer,
etc' A little later Mr. Coy built a pole line nearly seven miles in
length and ran a circuit to the lighthouse at the east end of the harbor,
thus benefiting shipping interests by the prompt transmission of cau-
tionary weather reports, and also enabling his subscribers to keep track
of the arrival of steamers and other marine craft.

On May 1, 1878, Mr. Coy had telephones ' placed near the targets,'
and also 'at the shooting-stand,' connecting the latter to the central
exchange, thus enabling his subscribers to keep informed concerning
the scores made at the annual meeting of the rifle association. Another
feature that is considered essentially modern was introduced in New
Haven by this company. On November 4, 1878, it advertised that " in
order to facilitate the collection of election returns from the different
wards in this city, to-morrow, the company has made arrangements
for placing a telephone in or near each voting place, in order that the
returns may be sent to the central office as soon as declared. The re-
turns will be furnished to any subscriber upon inquiry by telephone."
Later the daily papers stated that ' the telephone was of great use in
collecting and transmitting election returns.'

During the first two months Mr. Coy's exchange occupied one half
of a ground-floor store room in the Boardman building, corner Chapel
and State Streets, New Haven. This room then bore the number 219
Chapel Street, but is now 733. Then the exchange was moved to the
top floor of the Ford building, directly across Chapel Street; but the
office of the company remained in the Boardman building.

Until March 1, 1878, service was given only from 6 a.m. to 2 a.m.,
the night operator remaining on duty until that early morning hour
in order that the newspapers might have telephone service up to the
hour of going to press. For newspaper reporters quickly realized what
a blessing the telephone was in accelerating the transmission of a scoop,
or a good story, or a simple news item, and utilized the service on every
possible occasion.

Prior to 1877, if anything happened at a point distant from a tele-
graph office, and branch telegraph offices in cities were few and far
between in those days, reporters were in the habit of gathering the

52 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

names of the participants and the essential facts, and then hastening
with all possible speed to the editorial rooms. Late at night few horse
cars were running (then the trolley-car was unknown), and rarely was
it possible to secure cab or carriage on the scene of action ; so getting a
good story often meant a long, steady trot for many blocks before the
editorial rooms were reached. To-day a reporter can prepare his copy
on the premises, walk to the nearest telephone, talk it to an assistant
in the editorial rooms who typewrites it as it comes over the wire, and
the e scoop ' or ' story ' is on the street in less time than the reporter of
1876 would have consumed in riding or running to his office. And
with the aid of the telephone, the city editor in the large cities often
makes many assignments without seeing the respective reporters for
days at a time. In fact, in the larger cities, certain reporters now
communicate by telephone with the editorial rooms every half hour
while on duty, and only visit the main office to draw their salaries.

After March 1, continuous day and night service was given.
During the first week one boy operator, Louis H. Frost, son of the
treasurer, was the sole operating force ; then Julian Cramer was added ;
on March 1 Fred A. Allen was employed; and later came Charles W.
Dow. The night operator received a salary of $15 a month, and
worked from 5 p.m. to 8 a.m. Incidentally it may be added that Mr.
Allen and Mr. Dow are still employed in the New Haven telephone
exchange, and that Mr. Frost is in the livery business in that city.

In building his subscriber-lines, Mr. Coy erected very few poles
during the first four months. The grounded-iron circuits were sup-
ported on brackets fastened to the sides and roofs of buildings, and to
trees, the owners of the property usually making no charge for this
right of way. Owing to this method of suspension no two spans of
wire were the same in length, and slack wire was in evidence the year
through. Hence, it was only natural that the talking qualities of
these circuits should never be very good, and invariably be very low
whenever these wire festoons were swayed by the wind against tin roofs,
or were grounded on wet roofs or on the dripping branches of trees.

Thus it naturally came about that on drizzling days the amount of
shouting required on the part of subscribers striving to carry on a
conversation with the aid of a single hand telephone was a source of
much amusement to non-participants, and a probable cause of much
profanity and ill-feeling to many users of the service. And all the
blame was placed upon the little wooden telephone in place of the
wretched construction and the circuits that were constantly being
crossed or grounded on wet roofs or on the branches of trees. Had
these early lines been built with all the care and under the engineer-
ing supervision now expended on the heavy copper metallic circuits,

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE 53

excellent talking service would, no doubt, have resulted. For there
were few vagrant currents sneaking around in those days.

Yet back to these cheaply constructed subscriber-lines and that
crude equipment is easily traced the origin of the marvelous system of
intricate switchboard mechanism, practical and standardized methods,
and progressive operation known as the modern telephone exchange,
and by the aid of which a subscriber in New Haven may now talk with
greater ease to a subscriber in Pittsburg, or in Chicago, than was pos-
sible when the two subscribers were distant only a block away on wet
pioneer days in Connecticut. That is, less shouting would be required.

With the accumulation of experience in constructing telephone
pole lines covering a period of a quarter of a century, we might wonder
that Mr. Coy should have put up telephone lines of so crude a character.
But from whom could he gain experience concerning the construction
of telephone lines? He built the first commercial telephone line ever
constructed. Owing to the bitter competition existing between the
telegraph companies, the telegraphers of those days strove not to see
how good a telegraph line could be built, but how cheaply it could be
constructed and yet carry messages when ' sufficient battery ' was
used. Battery current cost but little, and properly-constructed pole
lines brought no higher price than rickety lines, when the inevitable
consolidation was brought about by cut rates. Then the promoter
pocketed his profit, and the public footed the bill in an increase of
rates to cover interest charges on the duplicate and non-earning in-
vestment. In the words of a governmental report dated January,
1869:

There is no uniformity in telegraph rates. They are often less to a distant
(competing) station than to an intermediate one on the same line. In other
countries the rates are reduced with the growth of business and never raised.
In this country they are reduced by competition, followed by consolidation of
the competing companies, and subsequent increase of rates, without regard to
the growth of the business.

Yet Mr. Coy followed the approved American practise of 1878, a
practise that prevailed for several years thereafter, as is evident from
the official instructions issued by the parent Bell company during the
years 1879-81. And these instructions certainly make interesting
reading, now that uniformity in methods and standardization in equip-
ment and stability in construction are rigidly insisted upon by all
legitimate telephone companies.

It was comparatively easy to run telephone circuits in those pioneer
days when only telegraph or signal companies were stringing wires.

There were no trolley wires until 1884, and no central station light-
ing plants prior to 1879. In 1873 William Wallace was building his
relatively large magneto-machines in Ansonia, which early in 1874

VOL. LXX. — 4.

54 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

were connected up and used as dynamos in lighting his factory. In
1875 he brought out a more compact dynamo that ' was in operation
furnishing current for electric lights in Machinery Hall during the
entire period of the Centennial.' In 1877 two Brush ' dynamos built
for lighting were exhibited and tested at the Franklin Institute in
Philadelphia/ with a ' ring-clutch ' arc lamp. The first Brush
* dynamo and lamp actually sold were shipped to Dr. Longworth, of
Cincinnati, about January, 1878/ and installed by Charles F. Brush.
In April, 1879, twelve Brush lamps were installed in Cleveland for
street lighting, and ' on December 20, 1880, Broadway, New York,
from Fourteenth to Twenty-sixth street was first lighted with fifteen
Brush lamps/ The first Edison central station was opened in New
York on September 4, 1882.

Ten years after the opening of the first telephone exchange central
electric-lighting stations were in operation in all principal cities. Of
electric railways, in the beginning of 1887, in the United States ' there
were only ten installations with an aggregate of less than forty miles
of track and fifty motor cars, operated mostly from overhead lines
with traveling trolleys.' The principal practical pioneers were Charles
J. Van Depoele who built an experimental trolley system in Chicago
in 1882-83; Leo Daft who, a year later, operated an experimental
electric locomotive at Saratoga; Bentley & Knight who placed an ex-
perimental conduit system in operation in Cleveland, in August, 1884;
J. C. Henry who completed the trolley system in Kansas City in
1884-85, and Frank J. Sprague's experiments in 1885.

FOSSIL INSECTS 55

FOSSIL INSECTS AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE

CLASS INSECTA1

By ANTON HANDLIRSCH
ADJUNCT CURATOR, ROYAL IMPERIAL NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM, VIENNA, AUSTRIA

rpo the majority of mankind, who supposedly are inclined to look
-*~ on the bright side of life, the sound of the word ' insects ' ever
recalls the picture of a wide-awake boy with a green net and possibly
with a botanical box of the same hue, but more vivid in color, chasing
along after the variegated butterflies and beetles. He seldom over-
takes them, but positively assures us that he already has a ' nearly
complete collection of insects of fifty or more species.' With this
same word ' insects ' many a pessimist, however, will bring to mind
only the small troublesome pests of his home, perhaps even of his own
worthy person, or certain minute organisms to which he indirectly
ascribes the cause of the more and more frequently recurring adultera-
tion of his wine. In each instance, the matter will be quickly des-
patched either with a good-natured smile or with a gentle imprecation,
and only rarely does Homo sapiens attempt to make clear to himself
what the word ' insects ' really signifies.

That insects constitute a subdivision of the Arthropoda, to which
group spiders, crabs and myriapods also belong, and that they are dis-
tinguished by the possession of only six legs and four or two wings,
have with other details doubtless been acquired at school, where, too,
knowledge was surely gained of many forms because of their usefulness
(bees and silkworms) or because of their injurious character (moths,
bark-scarabs and plant-lice).

Of the immense part that insects play in the household of nature
and especially in science, however, of their truly wonderful diversity
in bodily structure, of their organization, habits of living and develop-
ment, as well as of the number of species, the greatest ignorance still
prevails everywhere.

In proof of this not too flattering assertion, therefore, we will at
once proceed to give a statistical summary, strictly in round numbers,
of the insects now existing and scientifically recorded and named.

About 3,000 species of grasshoppers and crickets (Locustidas and
Gryllidas) are known, whose music fills the woods and meadows of both

1 Translated from the German by Lucy Peck Bush, Peabody Museum, Yale
University. (Mitt. d. Sect. f. Naturk. d. Osterreich. Tour.-Klub, April,
1905, pp. 25-30.)

56 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

hemispheres; and about 4,000 species of their nearest relatives, the
locusts, or Acrididse, to which group the notorious migratory locusts
also belong. It is estimated that there are about 2,500 kinds of spec-
ters, or walking-sticks (Phasmidse), which inhabit tropical regions
chiefly and are noted for their close resemblance to twigs and leaves.
Much smaller is the number of those creatures called earwigs, although
they are neither worms nor crawl into the ears; scientifically they are
termed Dermaptera, and comprise about 500 species. Less noteworthy
are the 200 forms of small thrips, or Physopoda. The stately, but
harmless, praying-crickets, or Mantidse, are represented throughout the
world by only 800 different species. On the other hand, about 1,200
kinds of cockroaches, or Blattidae, are known, and this family unfor-
tunately includes the small Croton-bug and its larger black cousins.
In warm countries, with these troublesome creatures are associated
about 400 different species of white ants. The very small insects called
body-lice, book-lice or wood-lice, which belong to the Corrodentia or
Copeognatha, are represented in almost equal numbers. Mallophaga
(bird-lice, which should not be confounded with bird-ticks) already
number 1,300 species, for nearly every kind of bird has its special
parasite. On the other hand, luckily, only 50 species of true blood-
sucking lice have become known, a relatively high percentage of which
afflicts mankind. One hundred and sixty thousand species is certainly
not too large a figure to include the hosts of beetles, or Coleoptera,
which people every corner of the globe, and may be obtained in the
region of perpetual ice as well as in salt marshes. We are acquainted
with but 52,000 species of Hymenoptera, or membrane-winged insects,
among which are the many ' wild ' relatives of the honeybee, the colo-
nies of ants, the true wasps, digger-wasps, ichneumon-flies, gall-flies,
saw-flies, golden-wasps and wood-wasps. Of dragon-flies, or libellids
(Odonata), there may be about 2,300 different kinds at present de-
scribed, while 300 species of May-flies (Plecoptera) and stone-flies
(Perlidae) are recognized. True JSTeuroptera (netted-winged insects),
which also include the ant-lions and lace-winged flies, number 1,400
species; Panorpidse, or scorpion-flies, about 100, and caddice-flies, or
Phryganeidse, 1,200. After the beetles, the forms most abundant in
species are the butterflies, or Lepidoptera; of these science has dis-
closed the existence of about 55,000 species up to the present time.
Next come the much less noted two-winged insects, or Diptera, of
which two main groups, Orthorrhapha (midges, gnats, horse-flies, etc.)
and Cyclorrhapha (true flies), with 14,000 and 30,000 species, re-
spectively, share in the sum total of insect forces. The number of
fleas, or Suctoria, is small in comparison, only 100 species as yet being
known, one of which lives on the blood of mankind. Further, if the
30,000 kinds of bugs, cicadas and plant-lice included in the Hemiptera,

FOSSIL INSECTS 57

or half wings, are counted, the round sum of 360,000 species of insects
now known is reached.

Estimates have been given showing that not more than one sixth
of all forms actually existing have as yet been described and named,
so that the number of species (not individuals) now living in the
present period of the earth's history may be placed at about 2,000,000.

It is quite conceivable that man in his effort to understand nature
everywhere surrounding him should not be satisfied merely to study all
these existing insects and arrange them in a system of orders, families,
genera, etc., but he would also wish to know how this greatest division
of the animal kingdom, in specific numbers about doubly exceeding
all other groups, has been developed, and how and when it has attained
its present size.

If we would really learn the primitive history of the insect tribe,
and not construct it in a speculative manner, we must descend into
the depths of the earth in order to see whether or not a fortunate
chance has possibly preserved some remains which might afford us an
insight into the insect life of previous ages.

If, as mentioned above, the number of various species of insects
now existing be taken in round numbers at 2,000,000, and for each
species at least 1,000,000,000 individuals yearly, which, judging from
the swarms of bees and gnats, colonies of ants and termites, parasites
of plants (often millions living on a single tree), certainly seems
legitimate, an annual total of 2,000,000,000,000,000 (two thousand
trillions) individuals is obtained, while during the time that man has
inhabited the earth some hundreds of trillions must have existed.

And of all these trillions of insect remains, which moderately com-
puted (about 100 to a gram) represent 1,000 billion kilograms in
weight, we have as yet found but a few hundred examples, and these
have been accidentally enclosed in gum (copal), in peat-beds, or
finally buried in hardened mud. They have thus become more or less
well preserved, and again by chance have fallen into our hands. All
these forms clearly demonstrate that the species of insects have not
materially altered during man's sojourn on the earth.

It may now be concluded that these results must lead only to dis-
couragement, for they show very plainly how small a percentage of the
insect world escapes complete destruction, and how slight is the pros-
pect of securing any of these remains.

Notwithstanding this, it has already come to pass that quite a num-
ber of fossil insects have been brought to light from analogous deposits
of older periods, and the explanation may be partly found in the fact
that even these older strata are to be estimated not only by thousands,
but probably by millions of years, so that the sum total of vanished
and preserved forms must evidently increase accordingly.

58 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Although in comparison with the hosts of living forms, researches
hitherto made have resulted in the insignificantly small number of
about 10,000 species of fossil insects, yet these few afford us a glimpse
into the insect life of past ages. Such a collection of extinct species,
moreover, much exceeds in numbers the recent forms in most univer-
sity and private collections, which have become the basis of so many
bold hypotheses. We can thus see or at least have some idea how in
the course of millions of years the present mighty tree has grown up
from so small and tender a plant.

Of the fossil insects thus far obtained, the larger part have come
from that important period immediately preceding the age of man.
This is designated the Tertiary period, or the age of mammals. Those
insect remains preserved in fossil gum (Baltic amber), like artistic
and permanent microscopic preparations, are indeed well known, and
of these many thousand specimens have been accumulated in museums.
On the other hand, less noted, but not less numerous, are the wonder-
ful impressions found in many places in laminated shales, as in
OEningen (Baden), Kadoboj (Croatia), in Italy, on the Ehine, in
Provence, in North America, etc. These are to be likened to nature's
own printing and provide us with an atlas of the Tertiary fauna in
which we find very many species that can scarcely be distinguished
from those living to-day. With the exception of bird-lice, lice and
fleas, all the principal existing groups of insect throngs are represented
in Tertiary time, but the remarkable bizarre forms which especially
delight our eyes to-day were much fewer in number then than now.
Thus very few large butterflies and no striking types of beetles, such
as we are accustomed to see in all shop-windows of the dealers, have
been discovered.

Even though the character of the Tertiary fauna in general did
not vary essentially from that now in existence, still the distribution
of forms over the earth must have been far different. For instance, in
Germany we find elements that now are met with only in tropical
lands, from which follows many a conclusion as to the variations of
climate and of the plant world. Moreover, the numerical distribution
of species in kindred groups was likewise not the same as that at
present in force, since among the Tertiary Hymenoptera a much
smaller percentage of bees is found, among the Diptera there are more
gnats than flies, among the Orthoptera far more grasshoppers than
locusts, and only very few walking-sticks, etc.

Further, when it is stated that in the Tertiary period no single
type of insect has been hitherto identified which does not still exist,
and that therefore the numerous amber preparations and the impres-
sions so beautifully preserved are as yet capable of giving no direct
answer to our question, we must then turn to the next older period,

FOSSIL INSECTS

Tabulae Summary of the Development of Insects in the Various Geological

Periods

Palaeodictyoptera (primitive insects, ancestors

of all other groups)

Protorthoptera (ancestors of the orthopteroids)
Orthopteroidea :

Orthoptera (straight wings):
Locnstoidea (grasshoppers and crickets) ...
Acridioidea (locusts)

Phasmoidea (specters, or walking-sticks)

Dermaptera (earwigs)

Physopoda (thrips)

Protoblattoidea (ancestors of the cockroaches

and mantids)

Blattuformia :

Mantoidea ( praying mantes)

Blattoidea (cockroaches)

Isoptera (termites)

Corrodentia (wood-lice or body lice)

Mallophaga (bird-lice)

Siphunculata (true lice)

Coleopteroidea :

Coleoptera (beetles)

Strepsiptera (fan wings)

Hymenoptera (membrane wings)

Mixotermitoidea (extinct provisional group)...

Hapalopteroidea

Hadentomoidea (? ancestors of the embids)

Embioidea (embids)

Perloidea (stone flies)

Protodonata (ancestors of the odonatids)

Odonata (libellids)

Protephemeroidea ( ancestors of the plectopteres)

Plectoptera (ephemerids, or May-flies)

Neuropteroidea (netted wings)

Megasecoptera (ancestors of the panorpoid

series?)

Panorpoid ea :

Panorpata (scorpion-flies)

Phryganoidea ( Trichoptera, or caddice-flies,
etc.)

Lepidoptera (butterflies)

Diptera (two wings):
Orthorrhapha (midges, gnats, horse-flies,

etc. )

Cyclorrhapha (flies)

Suctoria (fleas)

Protohemiptera (ancestors of the half wings)..
Hemiptera (half wings)

O ^ tn

SCO

0
0

*->
4)
S

1-5

03 .2

3,000

4,000

—

9 —

2,500

—

? —

—

500

—

200

—

9 —

0
0
0

&«

Sol

800

—

1,200

400

1,300

160,000

—

52,000

—

300

2,300

300

1,400

0
0
0
0
0

6
+

0
9

100

1,200
55,000

— o

14,000

30,000

100

30,000

—

0
0
0

0
0
?

0
9

o> .
o o

,si

+
+

0
0
0
0

—

-l_

—

0
0
0
0

0
0
0

0
0

0
0
0
0

0
0
0
0
0

The signs +, — , = denote that, compared with the same group as now existing, a group
falling in a given period was relatively more abundant, smaller, or equally developed, respect-
ively, in the next younger period.

6o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the Mesozoic, or the age of reptiles. Of its three chief divisions,
Cretaceous, Jurassic and Triassic, the first mentioned and youngest
has thus far yielded only a small number of fossil insects. During the
Cretaceous, the flowering plants came into existence, and on this ac-
count it may be concluded that a multitude of new conditions were
furnished for many kinds of insect forms. The bees and various other
honey-eaters could thus have originated. The fact that insects imme-
diately adapted themselves to these new plants is to be seen in the few
specimens thus far obtained; that is, in the galls and eaten places on
the leaves of the oak, willow and Eucalyptus, etc. Other than these,
unfortunately, but little evidence of insects has been found in the
Cretaceous.

On the contrary, the remains of this group preserved in Jurassic
deposits are very large in number. These have been discovered in
England, Spain and Eussia, but nowhere in such quantities and re-
markable preservation as in the Jura of Franconia in northern Bavaria,
where in previous epochs a shallow sea between coral reefs became
filled up with the finest calcareous silt. Many of the insects which
peopled the neighboring land found their graves in this mud. By a
fortunate chance, after perhaps millions of years, these forms have now
come to us, for this same hardened mud is to-day used by us as litho-
graphic stone or paving-stone.

Now what does this rich collection of Jurassic insects teach us?
It shows that in that period probably an entire series of groups of
living forms either then had no existence or were just in the process
of evolution. As yet are found no locusts, no earwigs, termites, thrips
and wood-lice. Of the Diptera, the only representatives are those
which are in the minority to-day ; of the Hymenoptera, the wood-wasp,
saw-fly and ichneumon-fly alone appear to have been present, while
bees, ants, etc., are wanting. Some primitive forms of butterflies have
been discovered, but these were at first erroneously regarded as cicadas.
Grasshoppers were abundantly developed and some of them, judging
from the structure of their legs, may have run about on the water or
wet mud quite as water-striders, a genus of aquatic insects, do at the
present time. Through their changed habits of living, these water
locusts thus appear to have modified the legs no longer needed for
jumping, and in this way the specters, or walking-sticks, may have
finally originated. Dragon-flies, May-flies, Neuroptera and Hemiptera
were represented in great variety, and of the last group there were
aquatic species as well as those terrestrial ; also small cicadas. Beetles,
too, were not wanting, although no particularly striking forms are to
be distinguished.

The fact that Jurassic insects were so extremely abundant clearly
indicates a warm climate, and the school children of Bavaria would

FOSSIL INSECTS 61

have to provide themselves with much larger nets should the thousands
of past generations of insects celebrate a joyous resurrection, for the
size of these Jurassic representatives was from four to five times that
of many forms now existing in the Danube region.

But these fertile years were apparently preceded by others more
barren. At least this impression is gained when we contemplate the
swarms of insects that lie buried in a stage still lower — the Lias, or
black Jura. The discovery of some rich localities in Switzerland, in
Mecklenburg and in England, for instance, have yielded almost abso-
lutely dwarf species. On the average, these forms were even smaller
than those inhabiting the same regions to-day; truly starved species.
In fact, at that time there were as yet no butterflies, few Hymenoptera,
and no other striking insects. The beetles and gnats found were small
and insignificant. On the other hand, caddice-flies and scorpion-flies
were abundantly .represented, the latter of which now play only a
limited part. There were also dragon-flies of moderate dimensions,
bugs and small cicadas similar to our frog-hoppers; grasshoppers and
locusts, and the ever-present cockroach as well.

From the long Triassic period that stored up a large part of the
material from which the imposing dolomite towers were subsequently
formed, we as yet unfortunately know only some insignificant beetles
and Neuroptera. Hence, we can turn at once to that very ancient
period called the Paleozoic. On important but purely material
grounds, this epoch stands very close to mankind in general, since it
includes the most valuable coal deposits, the mining of which has
materially aided our present studies. In and near the coal in many
places in Europe and North America has been found a great number
of impressions of insects whose investigation furnishes us with an
entirely new world of forms.

Although in the upper beds of this period no more beetles and
Neuroptera are found, yet caddice-flies and scorpion-flies, gnats and
locusts, too, are wanting. So much the more do the cockroaches in-
crease ! May-flies and stone-flies were already represented, and Hem-
iptera as well, but of a form that it is not known whether they should
be pronounced cicadas or bugs.

In addition we also find insects that it may not be possible to
arrange in the established classification of living forms, although
affinities with the latter are undoubtedly to be recognized. The deeper
we descend into the coal period, these forms more and more increase
in number, while modern types gradually become less and less frequent.
It may therefore be concluded that in the Carboniferous forms the
direct ancestors of many of the insect groups previously mentioned are
to be sought, and hence corresponding names have been chosen for
them: as Protodonata, the ancestors of the Odonata, or libellids;

62 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Protorthoptera, ancestors of the Orthoptera, or locusts, etc. Nearly all
these insects attained a considerable size; indeed, there were many the
span of whose wings measured much more than half a meter — they
were literally giants !

These forms, too, decrease in number, and at last there appears to
us a quite distinct fauna of primitive creatures, whose structure was
of the simplest order, and who were apparently without adaptation to
the definite modes of life which we are accustomed to see in nearly all
existing insects. These primitive forms we call ' Palseodictyoptera,'
and among them it is possible to distinguish a series of different genera
and species, all, however, having common characters and standing in
about the same degree of relationship to existing groups.

These palaeodictyopteres, therefore, constitute the first shoot of the
giant tree which we have to-day in the insect world.

As has been frequently indicated, we also see that the race of in-
sects has by no means remained unaltered since primitive times, but
that it has been subjected to precisely the same changes as have other
groups of animals. And the conclusions to be drawn from these
mutations are manifold. In the first place, they permit us to erect
a natural system in accordance with actual descent; they permit us to
weigh the characters accurately and to distinguish between those which
are old and inherited and those that are recent and acquired. More-
over, they afford us many and far-reaching conclusions regarding the
climate and the nature of the soil in those times and regions, as well
as the distribution of land and water, etc. Finally, by this means
we are also enabled to penetrate a very little into the future. And
this further shows us that eventually neither the boy with the green
net nor the imprecating pessimist will be so very far wrong, for the
immediate future probably belongs to the brilliantly colored insects, on
the one hand, and, on the other, to the troublesome and offensive
vermin, the parasites of man, animals and plants. These two extremes
appear to us to-day in their greatest development.

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 63

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA

By SPENCER TROTTER

SWARTHMOEE COLLEGE

WHEN Adam, or the cave man, began giving names to the things
of the earth and the things of the sky, it was probably with a
view to a better personal acquaintance with the objects and for a ready
means of conjuring up their images to the mind. In the same spirit a
learned professor later defined a system of classification as a series of
pegs to hang ideas on. If we are of a mind with Juliet as to the
matter of calling a rose by any other name, we accept an undeniable
fact, a scientific proposition, but we are at the same time in danger
of losing a certain flavor and zest of life, a subtle something in our
conscious relation to the things of this world. At least this is true of
those of us who are highly endowed with a sense of the fitness of a
name for the thing that it stands for. It is more than likely that the
man or woman possessing this keen relish for a name will unhesitatingly
repudiate the statement of Juliet, preferring rather to live in the
delightful delusion of the name itself. It is the conjuring up the
image of the thing, the making it a part of the inner conscious self,
that has so much to do with the background of our happiness. How
could it be otherwise in this age-long association of words and things?
Our life is a life of words, and whether we see the printed word, or
hear it spoken, it is to us one with the thing itself, and the thing itself
is but the word materialized.

This delight in a word for the sake of its associations, though in-
tensely personal, is after all in a large way a matter of race history.
What we call the ' mother tongue/ an expression that in itself suggests
the most vital relation in human life, is the handing down of inherited
speech; as important in its way as the transmission of blood and of
brain cell. As the bodily substance may change under the influence
of new environments, so a language may change under like conditions,
and yet each will bear throughout its structure the large features of
its ancestry. It is a matter of some interest to trace out the effects
of the new world on the thought and speech of the early colonists and
the incorporation of any changes thus wrought into the language of
the people. In pursuing this inquiry I have directed my attention to
the names imposed by the settlers on the natural features of the land
and the more familiar living objects, such as plants, mammals and
birds. These were obvious features in the physical environment, a
knowledge of which was often of the first moment to the pioneer, and

64 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

their names stand for a certain attitude of thought toward things more
or less familiar or things entirely new and strange.

The English stock that colonized the greater part of the Atlantic
seaboard of North America, very early left the marks of its language
on hill, valley and stream, and on fauna and flora. What objects it
did not designate with old world names were called by the names known
to the aboriginal peoples — Indian names — usually much altered pho-
netically. In some instances names were invented directly as ex-
pressive of some notable characteristic, and, again, some few were
borrowed from the languages of alien settlers. A very large propor-
tion of the names of natural objects in America are transplanted old
world names, a fact not at all surprising when we consider the general
similarity in topographical features and in the life forms, both plant
and animal, of eastern North America and western Europe, notably
England. A comparison of the forest trees of North America with
those of western Europe shows that a large proportion of the various
kinds are common to both sides of the Atlantic. The settlers found
much the same aspect of woodland that they had known at home.
There were oaks and beeches little different from those of Europe.
The same was true of the pines, firs, spruces and larches, and of the
birches, alders, aspens and poplars. The maple, elm, ash, plane tree,
chestnut, walnut, cherry, hazel and dogwood were broadly recognized
as familiar trees, though differing somewhat from their transatlantic
representatives. The comparatively few trees that were entirely
strange to the early colonists, as the hickory, sassafras, persimmon,
magnolia, buckeye and tulip tree, came to be known, for the most part,
by their aboriginal names, though much corrupted both in spelling
and in speech. The two last named trees — the buckeye and the tulip
— were so called, the first from the fancied resemblance of its nut to
the eye of a deer (a true backwoodsman's comparison), and the tulip
tree from its gorgeous blossoms. Beverley in his ' History of Vir-
ginia ' (1705) speaks of ' the large Tulip Tree, which we call a Poplar.'
The tree is not a poplar, but belongs with the magnolias, and the
compound ' tulip poplar,' frequently used at the present time, is an
unfortunate misnomer. The general similarity of the forests of
eastern North America and western Europe is the result of certain
geological conditions, among which was a once more or less continuous
land connection between the northern portions of the two continents,
together with a climate that allowed of a very wide dispersal of plants
and animals. Among mammals, the bear, wolf, fox, deer, hare or
rabbit, weasel, otter, badger, beaver, squirrel and others were recog-
nized as being closely allied to similar old world types. But with
the curious racoon and opossum, the colonists knew of no European
animals in any way like them, and we find John Clayton, in 1693,
naively writing of the racoon as ' a Species of a Monkey.' Besides

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 65

racoon and opossum the Algonquin tongue has given us such words as
' skunk/ ' chipmunk ' and ' moose.'

The early colonists, Puritan and Cavalier alike, were in the main
English yeomen. They came not from the crowded centers, but from
the rural districts, and it matters little from what district they came,
all had been in touch with nature in England, and planted deep in
their hearts was the love of fields and woods. This was not often
expressed, it was too deep-seated a sentiment, but we see its workings
in many an old chronicle. It was not what in the modern sense might
be termed poetic, though there were undoubted poets among them.
It was rather the feeling that an unlettered countryman has — a certain
inexpressible love for the soil and the things thereof. The English
emigrant to America was too much a part of his surroundings to see
nature from the poet's point of view. The modern esthetic cult — the
love of the beautiful — was not a portion of his mental equipment.
He had the inquisitive and acquisitive qualities of mind, the interest
in things for the sake of knowing about them, the attitude of the
curious, and, above all, an interest in the practical uses of natural
products. With this attitude of mind toward nature he set foot upon
the shores of the new world. The surroundings that he had left are
best pictured in the rural England of Shakespeare's and of Milton's
time. The richly green meadow pastures watered by abundant
streams, along the banks of which "Walton and his brother anglers
loved to loiter in the shade of broad-spreading trees; the rolling up-
lands and lines of low hills; the deeply ploughed fields and scattered
masses of woodland, with here and there a church spire peeping above
them; the hedge-rows blossoming with wild flowers and haunted by
innumerable song birds; ancient, ivy-mantled towers and drowsy ham-
lets, with noisy flocks of rooks and daws — these were the elements in
a landscape enveloped in the soft atmosphere of an English sky, and
with all the endeared associations of home, that the emigrant carried
in his mind and heart to x\merica. Little wonder that he sought in
his new surroundings for something to remind him of this old home.
The forbidding, untrodden wilderness hemmed him in on every side.
The puritan found a rugged land and a harsh climate; the cavalier, a
more generous display of nature; but each had to wrest wide areas
from the wilderness before the landscape could become in any sense
domestic. As this domestication of the land went on, the colonists
found birds coming about their dwellings, building nests in their
gardens and in the shelter of their barns, and they began taking note
of many of the wild plants that grew in their neighborhood. By the
time some of the earlier accounts were written, the settlers had already
made the acquaintance of a number of the more familiar kinds and
had given them names. It was the England of Elizabeth that was
transplanted in Xew England and Virginia, and a considerable body

66 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

of old world folk-lore was a part of this transplanting much of which
has come down to us in the names of plants and in the various other
forms of speech. Garden-craft and the ' art of simpling ' was a part
of every housewife's knowledge, and plants were diligently sought for
their healing virtues. Knowledge of this kind was also to some extent
gained from the Indian inhabitants. In all the earlier descriptions
of the new world such objects had a prominent place, together with
the character of the land and aboriginal peoples and the advantages
for settlement. One can see in these accounts the evident striving
of the European mind to find suitable names and to describe an object
by its likeness to familiar objects at home.

The few records that we have of the impressions of the earlier
colonists are scattered through old journals, letters and histories of
travel, and the references to plants and animals are often exceedingly
obscure as to the species indicated. The question of the origin of
names is at best recondite. Names are part of the folk-lore of peoples ;
they came into existence far back in a dim past, long before the period
of written history. When we do find them gathered in ancient vocabu-
laries, as in the one of Aelfric (955-1020 a.d.), we may be sure that
they were even then venerable with age. The new world has added
comparatively little to the stock of old world nomenclature. More
often an old name has been given to an entirely different thing from
the one that it originally stood for, and has been twisted into a new
meaning with new associations. Thus the word creek originally meant
the tidal estuary of a small river, a place where vessels might find
harbor, and it is so used throughout Great Britain to-day. In certain
parts of the United States, notably along the middle and southern
Atlantic seaboard, the word has been extended to the small tributary
of a river throughout its entire course. In England these little inland
streams are called ' brooks,' which is clearly their rightful name —
shallow water-courses with much tumbling and bickering over stony
places. Milton very clearly distinguishes between the two where in

' Paradise Eegained '

Freshet or purling brook,

may be contrasted with the lines in ' Paradise Lost '

Forthwith the sounds and seas, each creek and bay,
Both are here pictured with their characteristic associations, the one
as an upland stream, the other as a tidal inlet. In the Bible the word
' creek ' is used with perfect clearness as to its meaning in the descrip-
tion of Paul's shipwreck — " And when it was day, they knew not the
land : but they discovered a certain creek with a shore, into which they
were minded, if it were possible, to thrust in the ship." Here we have
the idea of a harbor in the use of the word. It is possible, I think, to
see how our brooks have come to be called ' creeks ' when we reflect
that south of New England the large rivers have many smaller streams

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 67

emptying into their tidal waters. The mouths of these are often deep
enough to make a shelter for vessels, and they were undoubtedly so
used by the early settlers. Hence the term ' creek ' and its extension
to the entire stream and to other similar streams far inland through-
out a wide extent of country.

In portions of the middle Atlantic region the word ' cripple ' was
formerly used for dense, low-lying thickets, especially in wet ground.
As a boy I occasionally heard it applied in this way, and it is quoted
by Murray as occurring in the Penn-Logan Correspondence (1705).
None of the dictionaries, however, attempt to trace it back to any
dialectic source, nor is it given, with like meaning, in the vocabularies
of provincial English. In the dialect of east England ' creeple ' means
to compress or squeeze, which might suggest the notion of a thicket.
But words were not coined by the early settlers through mere sug-
gestion; they had an ample supply for every-day use. This word
' cripple,' from its very local character, is undoubtedly a corruption of
the Dutch word ' kreupelbosch,' signifying ' underwood,' the Anglicized
form having been shortened by dropping the terminal ' bosch,' which
means a wood or forest, and is allied to our now obsolete words, bosky
and boscage. ' Kreupel ' is an adjective meaning lame and suggests
a creeping or halting mode of progression as in the common use of the
English word. One who toils painfully through thickets with much
inward, if not with outward, cursings will appreciate this most ex-
pressive word borrowed by our English settlers from their Dutch neigh-
bors on the Hudson.

Swamp is more generally used in the United States than in Eng-
land. It does not occur in the writings of either Shakespeare or Mil-
ton, though some of the minor poets make use of it and it is frequently
found in the early descriptions of the colonies. The word implies wet,
boggy ground in woods, with rank undergrowth, and is eminently
characteristic of the wilder conditions of this country as compared
with the more highly cultivated lands of Europe. The settlers, in
this instance, had a keen sense of the fitness of the name. They early
distinguished the treeless stretches of salt grass along the seacoast and
river estuaries by the word marsh. Fen rarely if ever finds its way
into American speech and writings, except when used in a poetical
sense, as in Longfellow's ' fens of the Dismal Swamp.' Swale appears
to have two meanings, a shady spot and a low rise of land. In pro-
vincial dialects it means both a vale and a shady place and in North-
amptonshire e a gentle rising in the ground.' In the western United
States it refers to a boggy depression in a generally level stretch of
country, and as a local word in New England it signifies an interval
(intervale) or hollow, an umbrageous spot — the haunt of woodcock
and other wild folk. Valley has replaced the older ' vale,' which now
is found only in the poets' verse, and ' dale ' has likewise suffered a

68 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

decadence save in the northern counties of England. Both vale and
dale, however, survive as the terminations of many place-names in
England and the United States. Valley seems to be equivalent to
the lowland along a river's course, while vale and dale have to do with
smaller streams, or more often with woodland hollows. In the fol-
lowing passage there is evidently this view in the writer's mind:

The Land higher up the Rivers throughout the whole country, is generally
a level Ground, with shallow Vallies, full of Streams and pleasant Springs of
clear water, having interspers'd here and there among the large Levels, some
small Hills, and extensive Vales. ( Beverley's ' Virginia.' )

In the south, and to some extent in the western states, the word
' branch ' is widely used for brook. Beverley, in his account of Vir-
ginia, speaks of ' Gravelly Branches of Chrystal Streams.' Freshet, now
synonymous with the overflow or flooding of a stream, was formerly
used in the same sense as brook, as in the line of Milton above quoted.
The term is said to be locally in use in Maryland to-day. Once when
fishing along a small stream in southern Nova Scotia, a young lad
who accompanied me remarked that it was ' most too low a freshet for
good fishing.' This was a new meaning of the word to one who always
had associated it with floods, but it was without doubt a survival, in a
slightly altered form, of its original sense. The Anglo-Saxon Fersc,
from which the modern English ' fresh ' is derived, meant ' on the
move/ and was originally applied to ' running ' or ' fresh ' water.
Run, synonymous with brook, is a survival in America of ' rine,'
' rindel ' and c runnel,' of old English dialects.

The word 'rabbit' perpetuates a surprising want of observation on
the part of those who first gave this name to the American species.
The so-called ' rabbits ' of this country are hares, not rabbits. Yet one
would argue himself unknown who was pedantic enough to speak of
hare-shooting before the ' great unwashed democracy of America.' The
true rabbit is an old world species, makes burrows for its habitations,
and brings forth helpless, naked young, as every boy knows who has
kept tame rabbits. The wild ' cotton-tail ' of this country, and all its
kin, never burrow, but make a ' form ' like the true hares of Europe,
and the young are lively, well furred little creatures from the moment
of birth.

America has lost some pleasing words which the English heart still
holds dear through many delightful associations. Copse and coppice
are thus lost to us on this side of the Atlantic. I feel sure that many
who live their lives in literature would be glad to call some beloved
patch of underwoods a ' coppice,' just for the sake of literary associa-
tions. One can do so to himself if he likes, but it is best to say
e thicket' to the world at large. And thicket is an old word and a
good one too, even when shortened to i thick/ as in provincial English.
It savors of wilder places than coppice, which refers to underwoods that
are annually cut for fuel and which put out fresh shoots each year,

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 69

while thicket has about it more of the delightful abandon of nature.
We are not alone in this matter of lost words in the common speech.
In England, as well as in America, the word glade has passed from
every-day speech, and more 's the pity, for it is a charming word when
associated with its real meaning of an open, sun-lit space in the woods,
a place of gladness in the midst of gloom.

The varied features of the American wilderness — swamp and creek,
hill, dale and river valley, and over all the forest of a primeval world
with its wild life untouched by any hand save that of nature — these
waited the coming of a people that would give them, by name and
word, a place and part in another world, a world of literature. A large
measure of man's curiosity concerning the things of his environment
has been directed to finding out the nature and virtues of the divers
kinds of plants that seemed to grow mainly for his use and delectation.
This plant lore antedates the oldest written history. From the very
beginning it has been a part of man's self in the food question and in
the healing of bodily ills. The greater number of our wild herbs and
trees, as well as the long domesticated varieties, received their names
in a time so long past that only the names themselves can reveal their
origin. Here is history that outdoes Homer and Herodotus and all the
writings of the ancients. In the words of Prior, the author of British
Plant Names, we are led, in thinking over these names, " to recall the
times from which they date, to picture to ourselves the living figures of
our ancestors, to hear them speaking their obsolete dialect, and almost
to make the weeds that shadow their grave tell more than their tomb-
stone of its sleeping inhabitants."

The early colonists found many plants in the new world of kinds
with which they were more or less familiar. Hence we find a predom-
inance of European names in our American flora. Aside from this,
many old world species began shortly to make their appearance in
America and soon became naturalized on American soil. It is a matter
of some interest to run through a Gray's ' Manual ' and note how many
of the species are naturalized from Europe. The origins of a large
number of our English plant names are involved in a curious attitude
of the medieval mind toward the productions of nature. These were
regarded as presenting by their forms, colors, or other properties, tokens
of the Divine will for the benefit of sinful man. This remarkable idea
was embodied in what was known as the doctrine of signatures, and is
thus set forth by William Coles in a quaint old work entitled the ' Art
of Simpling.'

Through Sin and Sathan have plunged Mankinde into an Ocean of In-
firmities, yet the Mercy of God which is over all his workes, maketh Grasse to
grow upon the Mountains, and Herbes for the use of Men, and hath not only
stamped upon them a distinct forme, but also given them particular Signatures,
whereby a Man may read, even in legible characters, the use of them.

A name that is dear to us as a welcome of the spring — hepatica —

7o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

came through this curious belief in signatures. Its three-lobed leaves
were supposed to bear some resemblance to the lobes of the liver ; hence,
according to the doctrine of signatures, the plant must possess virtues
that would heal the manifold complaints of that organ. Whitlow grass,
the Draba verna of the botanist, was thought to be good for the whitlow
or felon. Bloodroot, because of its red juice, could cure the bloody flux.
Dandelion, dent de Icon, was so called, according to Prior, by one
Meyster Wilhelmus, a surgeon, as set forth in the Ortus Sanitatis of
1486, from its wonderful virtue in the curing of disease, likening it
to a lion's tooth. Saxifrage, comfrey, birthwort, eyebright, self-heal
or heal-all, St. John's-wort, sanicle and a host of other more or less
familiar wild flowers, each bore some token of its use in the healing of
various diseases.1

There were many plants, however, that were named for other reasons
than that of signature, plants that were not reckoned in the art of
simpling. The daisy was the ' eye of day ' — daeges-eage — of the old
Anglo-Saxons, but the daisy that we know in America — the pest of
the farmer and the delight of the wayfarer — is not the daisy of Chaucer
and of Shakespeare. It is the great or ox-eye daisy, a plant of a differ-
ent genus. Why the ' wee, modest, crimson-tipped flow'r ' of Britain's
fields never gained a foot-hold in this country, while the great, white
ox-eye has become naturalized as our American daisy, is one of those
questions which the student of distribution has to solve. If we can
not have the poet's flower itself we must at least have the name; that
is the privilege of our inheritance. It matters little if we give the
name to another, even though it be a 'pernicious weed'; the name,
aside from the intrinsic beauty of the flower, endows it with a charm
that can never fade. Our eastern buttercups are mainly naturalized
species. The one that is truly indigenous — the early crowfoot (Ranun-
culus fascicularis) — grows on rocky hillsides and in open woods, not
in fields and meadows. There is little that touches the fancy in either
'butter' or 'cup,' but join the two in one word and you have a picture
of green pastures sprinkled with gold. The name is an old one. It
appears in early English speech, and some authorities would derive it
from ' button-cop,' literally ' button-head,' allied to the French bouton
d'or. 'Butter-cup,' however, has survived, possibly by virtue of its
golden chalice, and the name must always be associated with childhood
and with spring — with delectable places in the heyday of life. King's-
cups and gold-cups are other old names, and cuckoo-buds was still
another epithet given to these flowers, for we find it in old dialects and
in poetry —

1 This same religious significance is found in the term ' lady,' or ' ladies,'
applied to many plants both in England and America as a corruption of ' Our
Lady,' reference being to the Virgin Mary. From a more remote source, in
the old pagan mythology, ' Venus ' has survived in certain of our plant names —
as in Venus slipper (Cypripedium) , Venus comb, Venus looking-glass, etc.

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA n

And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue,
Do paint the meadows with delight,

Shakespeare, however, never once mentions ' buttercup ' and we are left
to infer the fact that it was buttercups that he had in mind, for it is
given as such in old vocabularies. Cuckoo-bud is a charming name, and
in England is suggestive of the time of year when the cuckoo begins to
sing. But, alas, our American cuckoo is a dismal failure as a vocalist,
though his morals are unimpeachable, and we have no good reason for
calling flowers after him.2

A number of familiar plant names occur in the writings of the old
herbalists, as in Gerarde's Herbal (1597), and in Parkinson's Paradisi
In Sole (1629), which contains 'The Garden of Pleasant Flowers.'
Here we find such names as crowfoot, toad-flax, snapdragon, columbine,
dittany, golden-rod, dog's-tooth violet and many more that sound pleas-
antly of wayside places. A large class of names are adoptions, applied
to plants more or less different from those that bore the original names
in England. Thus 'wake robin,' given locally in Great Britain to a
species of arum, has been transferred in America to the species of
Trillium. ' Jack-in-the-box,' a local name of the English arum, appears
in America as ' jack-in-the-pulpit,' bestowed upon a closely related
plant. Name after name of familiar American herbs and trees may
thus be traced back to the provincial speech of England.3 It might
even be possible to trace certain of the settlers back to the district in
England from which they emigrated by the local names which they
gave to certain plants in America. This at least offers an inviting field
for the student of folk-lore.

Of the names that are purely American in origin we have a few well-
known examples that have been derived from the Indian peoples.
Puccoon seems to have been a general name for plants that furnished
a juice used by the natives for dyeing and for decorating their bodies.
Clayton in the 'Flora Virginica' (1739) thus designates the blood-
root (Sanguinaria) , and it is the common name of several species of
gromwell (Lithospermum) which yield a yellowish juice, of the yellow-
root (Hydrastis), and also of the poke- weed (Phytolacca) the berries
of which stain a deep purple. The word ' poke ' is probably a corrup-

2 A great variety of English wild flowers have been called after the cuckoo,
but few if any have survived in American speech. The cuckoo's name appears
not only among plants, but in numerous other objects and customs as a sur-
vival of old English rural life. Thus, the term ' cuckoo-ale ' which is found in
provincial dialects, is ' ale drank to welcome the cuckoo's return.' " A singular
custom," acccrding to Wright, " prevailed not long ago in Shropshire, that as
soon as the first cuckoo had been heard, all the laboring classes left work, and
assembled to drink what is called the cuckoo ale." The sweet influence of the
hedge-row was evidently close to the heart of these simple country folk.

3 Dogwood, for example, is a name having no reference to the animal, but
is derived from the old English dagge — a skewer, the wood having been used by
butchers for this purpose. Witch-hazel has nothing whatever to do with
witches, notwithstanding its repixted powers in divination, but is borrowed
from the wych-elm, the wood of that tree having been used in making chests
called ' wyches.' (Prior.)

72 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tion of the original ' puccoon,' as suggested by Bartlett. ' Hickory ' is
the Anglicized ending of the Algonquin word powcohicora which meant
a dish compounded of the kernel of the hickory nut, without reference
to the tree itself. Persimmon, sassafras, papaw, catalpa, pipsissewa,
pecan, chinquapin, cohosh, maracock (passion flower), kinnikinnik,
and others are all more or less garbled forms of aboriginal names.
Certain species became known by names suggested from their early
association with certain uses or from various peculiarities and proper-
ties. Rattlesnake-root and rattlesnake-plantain were greatly esteemed
by the native peoples as antidotes for the poison of the reptile. A
number of different plants bear the name of 'snake-root/ all of them
with supposed virtues in curing the bites of serpents. One of them,
the Virginia snake-root (Aristolochia Serpentaria), figures in Gerarde's
' Herbal.' " There's the Snake-Root," says Beverley, " so much admired
in England for a Cordial, and for being a great Antidote in all Pesti-
lential Distempers." A ' swamp-root ' was very early used by the
settlers in Virginia for the fever and ague, and the virtues of some
plant bearing this name are still exploited, at least in the advertisements
of quack doctors. The old chroniclers of America were profound be-
lievers in ' simples,' and the early accounts of the country set forth,
at considerable length, the medicinal value of various plants. Josselyn,
in ' New England's Rarities Discovered,' is a mine of information in
this respect. Uses, other than medicinal, have given rise to certain
local names. The candle-berry tree — the sweet bay or myrtle of Caro-
lina (Myrica) — was so called from the use of its wax-like berries in the
making of candles by the settlers. " If an Accident puts a Candle out,
it yields a pleasant Fragrancy to all that are in the Room; insomuch,
that nice People often put them out, on purpose to have the Incense
of the expiring Snuff."

Such names as squaw-root, papoose root, Seneca snake-root, bow-
man's root, Osage orange, arrowwood, Indian turnip, and the like,
have a decided aboriginal flavor and probably hold a story quite as
fascinating as any in the Anglo Saxon lineage. Dim pictures of the
life of this vanished people will rise before the mind with many of
these plant names. The beautiful native orchids of the genus Cypri-
pedium that grow in remote woodland places, are called by their Indian
name of ' moccasin flower ' quite as often as by that which allies them
to the old world history of plants and men. In Gray's Manual there
is a short sentence that to me has a peculiar and indefinable charm,
where wild tobacco is spoken of as occurring in ' old fields from New
York westward and southward: a relic of cultivation by the Indians.'
What a picture in this brief statement of wigwams in the ancient woods,
or in sun-lit clearings, with Indian women hoeing among their maize,
squashes, and tobacco !

The effort of the early colonists to give familiar titles to the objects

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 73

which they found in their new home is apparent in the vernacular names
bestowed upon a number of our native birds. It was most natural that
a bird so well known and so generally beloved as the English robin-
redbreast should find a namesake in America, even though very different
in habits and appearance. When the engaging birds with russet breasts
came about the New England settlements in early spring, and cheerful
pipings sounded through the clearings, ' robin ' became a term of wel-
come and endearment, In some early notices of the bird the entire
old world name of robin-redbreast was given. ' Daw ' was an early
name given to the crow blackbird or purple grackle by the settlers in
the Middle Colonies and in Virginia. Though but distantly related
to the jackdaw of England, this grackle4 undoubtedly suggested the
name from its habit of gathering in colonies about dwellings, where
in the tops of tall pines and other shade trees it builds bulky nests.
The jackdaw frequents belfrys and towers, but our blackbird has more
of the rook in its nature, although a very different bird both in size
and general appearance. The flocking of these grackles about the
grounds of country houses and the noise of their vernal clatter is a
welcome sign of returning spring. It savors of old homesteads in
cultivated lands and suggests ancestral holdings, like the rooks in an
English spinney or the daws in castle towers. In this vein of thought
Lowell says ' they are the best substitute we have for rooks.' ' Black-
bird ' could only have been suggested by the generally dark color of the
bird seen at a distance and in certain lights. There is nothing about
our grackle that is in any way like the English blackbird.

A name is frequently the symbol of some striking characteristic as
of color, or peculiarity of voice. Bluebird, redbird, yellow warbler,
goldfinch and many others are full of color suggestion, while cat-
bird, chat, phcebe, bobolink, towhee, song sparrow, and the like, appeal
to the auditory sense. The bluebird, the nearest we have in this
country to the English robin-redbreast and quite as lovable a bird in
its way, has found a place in literature as it has in the hearts of all
true lovers of the countryside. Alexander Wilson, poet and ornitholo-
gist, but first of all a poet, felt the charm of this bird when he immor-
talized its name in sympathetic prose and verse. The cardinal grosbeak
was known as e redbird ' to the Virginia settlers, and, later, when much
prized in London as a cage bird, its mellow, whistling notes won for it
the title of ' Virginia nightingale.' ' Cardinal ' has without doubt
come into our language through the French of Louisiana, and possibly
also, from the West Indies. The final 'grosbeak' is little used in
general talk. I have lately heard some persons speak of this bird as the

4 We are indebted to science for this word ' grackle ' which is an Anglicized
form of the Latin Gracula — a jack daw, a proof that even the scientific mind
was biased in favor of recognizing the distant relationship. The black bird of
England is a thrush — the ouzel cock or merle of the old English poets.

74 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

' Kentucky Cardinal/ an illustration of the influence of literature in
idealizing a thing and making it a part of one's emotional assets.

We have nothing in America that quite takes the place of the Eng-
lish skylark and the nightingale. The mockingbird, the thrasher, the
bobolink, the wood thrush, the hermit thrush, and the veery are so
entirely different in their songs and their surroundings that comparison
of any one of them with either of the foreign birds is impossible. Why
our great stalking meadow lark ever became a ' lark,' and not a ' starl-
ing ' as it should be called, is hard to see, unless its liquid spring notes
and its nesting in fields appealed to the early settlers in lieu of any
other bird better fitted to bear this glorious name. It seems to be a
clear case of name transfer for the sake of the name itself. The cat-
bird is damned by such a title. His summer mewings have played an
ugly trick on him, for he is a songster of no mean ability. William
Bartram quaintly speaks of his endeavors at imitation, ' even in rehears-
ing the songs, which he attentively listens to, from the shepherdess and
rural swain ' — words that call up an Arcadian scene that even Theoc-
ritus might have loved; a haunt of Pan in days before the smoke and
noise of modern industry sullied the sweet air of fields and groves.

The reader may ask — Why all this pother about names? A name
is a name, and, though its history be of passing interest, what need
further to talk about it? If literature is the reflection of a people's
life the words which give it form and substance are a part of the life
itself, at least of its emotional and intellectual reactions. Our appre-
ciation of nature comes so largely through literature, and literature has
so greatly extended our sympathy toward things natural, both animate
and inanimate, that in this world of words we may be said almost to
live and move and have our being. This is the plea that is made for
the interest in a name; for the better understanding of the really vital
part that it plays in human life.

The past fifty years have seen the growth in America of a remark-
able interest in nature, not only in its scientific aspects, but in its
esthetic appeal as well. The modern cult of l nature study ' is an ex-
pression of this interest and as such is altogether salutary. How much
this attitude toward nature is fostered by literature is apparent in the
mass of matter that has been and is being written upon the subject.
Where one person has reached this state of mind through a sort of
primitive instinct that takes him out into direct contact with nature,
fifty persons have been led into the same happy state through some
appreciative writer like Gilbert White, Richard Jefferies, Thoreau or
Burroughs. A truly good book, one that makes its appeal to the heart,
calls us into the open where the whole man is refreshed by nature at
first hand. In order to read understanding^ and sympathetically, one
must know the real thing itself, must have had his senses quickened
by the thousand influences of wood and field. Then a name will have

NATURE NAMES IN AMERICA 75

a meaning to the reader that it never before possessed, and its history
will have a meaning when he finds it in the writings of the old world
authors. Those of us who are in the middle years of life can remember
when our juvenile nature literature was almost entirely English and
we became more intimately acquainted with the robin-redbreast and
the nightingale, the skylark and the thrush, than we did with our own
native birds, whose names were often quite unknown to us. The
writings of the English poets and authors from Chaucer down are full
of allusions to birds and flowers with which most of us have grown
familiar by name only. Shelley's ' Skylark ' and Keats' ' Ode to a
Nightingale ' have made the names living realities to many who have
never seen or heard these birds. There are sweet singers in our own
country that must take a place in literature, and their names will be
doubly dear to the heart through an intimate acquaintance with the
birds themselves. One of the most sympathetic of our modern writers
has voiced this thought in an exquisite bit of verse — ' The Wood-notes
of the Veery.'

If two different birds, or two different flowers, in England and
America bear the same name, there is no need to cavil, only to recognize
the fact that there is a difference. This extension of the name is in
itself a source of great interest; it helps to link us to the life and
literature of past generations, and in so doing to develop an intelligent
and sympathetic understanding. One might have in mind our crow
blackbird when reading Tennyson's poem — ' The Blackbird,' and fail to
see its truth and beauty, simply by not knowing that there are several
birds of this name.

A golden bill! the silver tongue,

Cold February loved, is dry:

Plenty corrupts the melody
That made thee famous once, when young:

No one who knew our blackbird could ever apply this description to
him. It more aptly applies to the robin than to any other bird in this
country. The golden bill; the silver tongue of our early spring; the
corruption of melody when gorged with autumnal fruit; all these are
thrush attributes and apply with equal pertinence to both species.

An appreciation of the rightful meaning of a name will go far
toward making a true mind picture of the thing itself. A poet like
Tennyson was a keen observer of nature, to the slightest detail, and a
reader gains the greater pleasure when he divines this quality in the1
poet's verse. This is not a scientific attitude of mind, not the attitude
of a carping critic, but the realization of a certain beauty because of
a certain truth — and truth is after all the one thing needful, the only
thing that satisfies the soul.

76 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

COMPABATIVE PSYCHOLOGY

By Pkofrssor C. JUDSON HERR1CK

DENISON UNIVERSITY

/~] OMPAEATIVE psychology has arrived. We have had our Des-
^-^ cartes and our psychic epiphenomenalists ; and their descendants,
the vital mechanicians, are still with us. And no Luther has arisen
to shatter at a stroke their gods (of tin and other artificers' materials)
and proclaim the reformation of psychology in a single revolutionary
coup. No Darwin has struck off a hypothesis of psychogenesis full
grown and puissant to drive its decadent rivals from the field by virtue
of its own all-assimilating vitality. But the leaven of Darwinism
has been slowly permeating, even into the dusty meal bins of specula-
tive psychology. In spite of fervid anathemas from the citadels of
the categorical intuitionalists, the steady growth of genetic ideas has
by natural process begun to corrode the very foundations of these
strongholds of conservatism ; for have we not already begun our natural
history of the intuitions and their genesis ?

It has been pointed out as a most hopeful sign that this new
psychology (unlike that sometimes falsely so called) does not come
bearing as its ikons a glittering array of brass instruments of precision
and tomes of statistics; but, like the kingdom of Heaven, it cometh
not with observation, as a change of mental attitude among both
psychologists and naturalists.

There is apparently no general recognition of the revolutionary
character of this feature, which is implicit in many movements now
current in science and philosophy — movements bearing as diverse labels
in the philosophical vernacular of the day as ' experimental evolution/
'genetic psychology' (in a score of mutually antagonistic forms),
' pragmatism,' ' functional philosophy,' ' paidology,' ' dynamic monism/
etc., etc. So far as the genetic element in these systems is true, it is
destined to outlive its ephemeral and sometimes bizarre setting, and
the day when we shall have a generally accepted doctrine of psycho-
genesis and psychic evolution is certainly not far off, though it would
be folly to assert that this day has yet dawned.

One of the most valuable features of the remarkable book by
Stanley Hall on the psychology of adolescence is the emphasis which
he places on the study of the past of mind as a corrective to the
morbid speculations on its future which comprise the larger part of

COMPARATIVE PSYCHOLOGY 77

the current doctrines of the soul. The ages of psychic evolution
through which we have passed have not only cast their shadows down
the ranks of time to our own day, but their life is now coursing in
our mental pulses as literally as in our corporeal. He goes on to say :

The best and only key to truly explain mind in man is in the animals he
has sprung from and in his own infancy which so faintly recapitulates them;
for about every property of the human mind is found in animal mind, as those
of higher animals are found in the powers of the lower. . . . The conscious
adult person is not a monad reflecting the universe, but a fragment broken off
and detached from the great world of soul, always maimed, defined by special
limitations, like, yet different from, all others, with some incommensurability
parting it off as something unique, well fitted to illustrate some aspects and
hopelessly unable to exemplify or even know other regions in the cosmos of
soul.

But the trouble is that as soon as a professional philosopher ap-
proaches the problems of the cosmic past of mind he is clapped auto-
matically into some metaphysical pigeon hole, whose rigid and often
misshapen walls determine that every effort which he puts forth must
be molded by past tradition. The very assimilation of the newer data
of science, which are the philosopher's meat and drink, involves their
incorporation into a metaphysical system already thoroughly organized,
and so we read our metaphysics backward through the cosmic process.

The naturalists, accordingly, are calling for a new Naturphilosophie
which shall be ' anti-metaphysical/ and yet every new such attempt on
their own part seems to present more serious metaphysical vices than
the preceding. It is obvious that the hope for an anti-metaphysical
philosophy is vain, for human philosophic systems flow into meta-
physics as the sparks fly upward.

But what shall be the foundation of that metaphysic and the man-
ner of its building is the naturalist's own problem. Shall it be an
a priori system based upon ancient and mediaeval dialectic or shall it
be an organic growth whose roots sink deep into the soil of scientific
observation and induction ? This is a very burning question ; for while
we can have a practically efficient hod-man type of science without
metaphysics, there can be no hope of a future for any metaphysics
which is not built up and sustained by the progress of science.

This, of course, can only mean that our metaphysics can not be
bound down by the rigid categories of formal logic (which is but a
crystallization of the past workings of the human mind) ; it too must
be alive with the lusty vigor of active growth. That such a meta-
physic is not unattainable is evident. Certain present tendencies are
nothing less than revolutionary in the direction of a really vital meta-
physic, and not a few men of science are making their contributions to
the same end.

And herein lies the great hope and promise of an immediate fruit-

78 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

fulness in the field of comparative psychology. For the first time in
the history of thought, we have both a scientific and a philosophic
public sentiment ripe for a serious attempt at a correlation in scientific
channels of mental and physical evolution and of mind and body in
the broader view.

But how imperfectly are we able to enter into the inner life of
even the higher animals whose minds are most like our own ! And
yet, who knows how many of the powerful, though subconscious springs
of our own impulse and motive may lie concealed in inherited vestiges
of long- vanished and far more remote ancestral mental powers? Who
knows what may be the mental life of a catfish, whose barbels and
whole outer body surface are covered with organs of taste and whose
gustatory nerves and centers are the biggest in the brain, or of a
shark which has an elaborate system of sense organs (the lateral line
canals), totally unknown to our own experience, which reach the ex-
treme dimensions of the body and serve as a sort of intermediary appa-
ratus between the organs of touch and the labyrinth of the ear, which
is likewise highly developed, though the fish is apparently nearly or
quite deaf?

The first task of comparative psychology, then, is to define as
accurately as we may with the imperfect means at command the sensori-
motor life of the whole range of lower organisms. And this task is
fortunately not only approachable, but intrinsically attractive to every
lover of nature. The study in field and laboratory of the sensory life
of animals, while not all of comparative psychology, is a necessary in-
troduction to its larger correlations and is receiving a rapidly increas-
ing attention by naturalists of all schools; for the development of a
true comparative psychology is, as we have seen, bound up with some
of the greatest of the current movements in both science and philosophy.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

I B R t

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

By M. H. POINCARE

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

§ 3. Tactile Space
1 1 THUS I know how to recognize the identity of two points, the point
-*- occupied by A at the instant a and the point occupied by B at the
instant /?, but only on one condition, namely, that I have not budged
between the instants a and /?. That does not suffice for our object.
Suppose, therefore, that I have moved in any manner in the interval
between these two instants, how shall I know whether the point oc-
cupied by A at the instant a is identical with the point occupied by B
at the instant (3? I suppose that at the instant a, the object A was in
contact with my first finger and that in the same way, at the instant /?,
the object B touches this first finger; but at the same time, my muscular
sense has told me that in the interval my body has moved. I have
considered above two series of muscular sensations S and S', and I have
said it sometimes happens that we are led to consider two such series
S and S' as inverse one of the other, because we have often observed that
when these two series succeed one another our primitive impressions
are reestablished.

If then my muscular sense tells me that I have moved between the
two instants a and /?, but so as to feel successively the two series of
muscular sensations S and S' that I consider inverses, I shall still con-
clude, just as if I had not budged, that the points occupied by A at
the instant a and by B at the instant /? are identical, if I ascertain that
my first finger touches A at the instant a and B at the instant /?.

This solution is not yet completely satisfactory, as one will see.
Let us see, in fact, how many dimensions it would make us attribute to
space. I wish to compare the two points occupied by A and B at the
instants a and /?, or (what amounts to the same thing since I suppose
that my finger touches A at the instant a and B at the instant /?) I
wish to compare the two points occupied by my finger at the two
instants a and /?. The sole means I use for this comparison is the
series 2 of muscular sensations which have accompanied the movements
of my body between these two instants. The different imaginable
series 2 form evidently a physical continuum of which the number of
dimensions is very great. Let us agree, as I have done, not to consider
as distinct the two series 2 and 2 -f- s -f- s', when s and s' are inverses
one of the other in the sense above given to this word; in spite of this

80 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

agreement, the aggregate of distinct series 2 will still form a physical
continuum and the number of dimensions will be less but still very-
great.

To each of these series 2 corresponds a point of space ; to two series
2 and 2' thus correspond two points M and M'. The means we have
hitherto used enable us to recognize that M and M' are not distinct in
two cases : (1) if % is identical with %' ; (2) if 2' = 2 -f- s + s'> s an(l s'
being inverses one of the other. If in all the other cases we should
regard M and W as distinct, the manifold of points would have as
many dimensions as the aggregate of distinct series 2, that is, much
more than three.

For those who already know geometry, the following explanation
would be easily comprehensible. Among the imaginable series of mus-
cular sensations, there are those which correspond to series of move-
ments where the finger does not budge. I say that if one does not
consider as distinct the series 2 and ~%-\- a, where the series a corre-
sponds to movements where the finger does not budge, the aggregate
of series will constitute a continuum of three dimensions, but that if
one regards as distinct two series 2 and 2' unless 2' = 2 + s -\-s', s and
s' being inverses, the aggregate of series will constitute a continuum of
more than three dimensions.

In fact, let there be in space a surface A, on this surface a line B,
on this line a point M . Let C0 be the aggregate of all series 2. Let
Ci be the aggregate of all the series 2, such that at the end of cor-
responding movements the finger is found upon the surface A, and C2
or C3 the aggregate of series 2 such that at the end the finger is found
on B, or at M. It is clear, first that Cx will constitute a cut which will
divide C0, that C2 will be a cut which will divide C1} and C3 a cut which
will divide C2. Thence it results, in accordance with our definitions,
that if C3 is a continuum of n dimensions, C0 will be a physical con-
tinuum of n -f- 3 dimensions.

Therefore, let 2 and 2' -f- a be two series forming part of C3 ; for
both, at the end of the movements, the finger is found at M ; thence
results that at the beginning and at the end of the series a, the finger is
at the same point M . This series a is therefore one of those which
correspond to movements where the finger does not budge. If 2 and
2 -f- o- are not regarded as distinct, all the series of C3 blend into one ;
therefore C3 will have 0 dimension, and C0 will have 3, as I wished to
prove. If, on the contrary, I do not regard 2 and 2 + cr as blending
(unless o- = s -f- s', s and s' being inverses), it is clear that C3 will con-
tain a great number of series of distinct sensations; because, without
the finger budging, the body may take a multitude of different atti-
tudes. Then C3 will form a continuum and CQ will have more than
three dimensions, and this also I wished to prove.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 81

We who do not yet know geometry can not reason in this way; we
can only verify. But then a question arises; how, before knowing
geometry, have we been led to distinguish from the others these series
a- where the finger does not budge? It is, in fact, only after having
made this distinction that we could be led to regard 2 and 2 -f- a as
identical, and it is on this condition alone, as we have just seen, that
we can arrive at space of three dimensions.

We are led to distinguish the series o-, because it often happens that
when we have executed the movements which correspond to these series
o- of muscular sensations, the tactile sensations which are transmitted
to us by the nerve of the finger that we have called the first finger,
persist and are not altered by these movements. Experience alone tells
us that and it alone could tell us.

If we have distinguished the series of muscular sensations s + s'
formed by the union of two inverse series, it is because they preserve
the totality of our impressions ; if now we distinguish the series a, it is
because they preserve certain of our impressions. (When I say that a
series of muscular sensations s ' preserves ' one of our impressions A,
I mean that we ascertain that if we feel the impression A, then the
muscular sensations s, we still feel the impression A after these sensa-
tions s.)

I have said above it often happens that the series o- do not alter the
tactile impressions felt by our first finger; I said often, I did not say
always. This it is that we express in our ordinary language by saying
that the tactile impressions would not be altered if the finger has not
moved, on the condition that neither has the object A, which was in con-
tact with this finger, moved. Before knowing geometry, we could not
give this explanation; all we could do is to ascertain that the impres-
sion often persists, but not always.

But that the impression often continues is enough to make the
series o- appear remarkable to us, to lead us to put in the same class
the series 2 and 2 + <r, and hence not regard them as distinct. Under
these conditions we have seen that they will engender a physical con-
tinuum of three dimensions.

Behold then a space of three dimensions engendered by my first
finger. Each of my fingers will create one like it. It remains to con-
sider how we are led to regard them as identical with visual space, as
identical with geometric space.

But one reflection before going further; according to the foregoing,
we know the points of space, or more generally the final situation of
our body, only by the series of muscular sensations revealing to us the
movements which have carried us from a certain initial situation to this
final situation. But it is clear that this final situation will depend, on
the one hand, upon these movements and, on the other hand, upon the
initial situation from which we set out. Now these movements are re-

VOL. LXX. — 6.

82 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

vealed to us by our muscular sensations; but nothing tells us the
initial situation; nothing can distinguish it for us from all the other
possible situations. This puts well in evidence the essential relativity
of space.

§ 4. Identity of the Different Spaces

We are therefore led to compare the two continua C and C engen-
dered, for instance, one by my first finger D, the other by my second
finger D'. These two physical continua both have three dimensions.
To each element of the continuum C, or, if you prefer, to each point of
the first tactile space, corresponds a series of muscular sensations 2,
which carry me from a certain initial situation to a certain final situa-
tion.1 Moreover, the same point of this first space will correspond to
2 and to 2 -\- a-, if o- is a series of which we know that it does not make
the finger D move.

Similarly to each element of the continuum C, or to each point of
the second tactile space, corresponds a series of sensations 2', and the
same point will correspond to 2' and to 2' + o-', if o-' is a series which
does not make the finger D' move.

What makes us distinguish the various series designated o- from
those called o-' is that the first do not alter the tactile impressions felt
by the finger D and the second preserve those the finger D' feels.

Now see what we ascertain: in the beginning my finger D' feels a
sensation A' ; I make movements which produce muscular sensations S;
my finger D feels the impression A; I make movements which produce
a series of sensations o- ; my finger D continues to feel the impression A ,
since this is the characteristic property of the series o-; I then make
movements which produce the series S' of muscular sensations, inverse
to S in the sense above given to this word. I ascertain then that my
finger D' feels anew the impression A'. (It is of course understood
that S has been suitably chosen.)

This means that the series s-f-ff-j-s', preserving the tactile im-
pressions of the finger I)' , is one of the series I have called o-'. In-
versely, if one takes any series a, s' -+- a -f- s will be one of the series
that we call <r.

Thus if s is suitably chosen, s -+- o- -f- sf will be a series a, and by
making a vary in all possible ways, we shall obtain all the possible
series a .

Not yet knowing geometry, we limit ourselves to verifying all that,
but here is how those who know geometry would explain the fact. In
the beginning my finger D' is at the point M, in contact with the object
a, which makes it feel the impression A'. I make the movements cor-
responding to the series S; I have said that this series should be suitably

1 In place of saying that we refer space to axes rigidly bound to our body,
perhaps it would be better to say, in conformity to what precedes, that we refer
it to axes rigidly bound to the initial situation of our body.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 83

chosen, I should so make this choice that these movements carry the
finger D to the point originally occupied by the finger D', that is, to
the point M; this finger D will thus be in contact with the object a,
which will make it feel the impression A.

I then make the movements corresponding to the series <r; in these
movements, by hypothesis, the position of the finger D does not change,
this finger therefore remains in contact with the object a and con-
tinues to feel the impression A. Finally I make the movements cor-
responding to the series 8'. As 8' is inverse to S, these movements
carry the finger D' to the point previously occupied by the finger D,
that is, to the point M. If, as may be supposed, the object a has not
budged, this finger D' will be in contact with this object and will feel
anew the impression A'. . . . Q. E. D.

Let us see the consequences. I consider a series of muscular sensa-
tions 2. To this series will correspond a point M of the first tactile
space. Now take again the two series s and s', inverses of one another,
of which we have just spoken. To the series s -f- 2 + s' will corre-
spond a point N of the second tactile space, since to any series of
muscular sensations corresponds, as we have said, a point, whether in
the first space or in the second.

I am going to consider the two points N and M, thus defined, as
corresponding. What authorizes me so to do? For this correspond-
ence to be admissible, it is necessary that if two points M and Mr,
corresponding in the first space to two series 2 and 2', are identical,
so also are the two corresponding points of the second space N and N',
that is the two points which correspond to the two series s -j- 2 + s' and
s -f- 2' -f- s'. Now we shall see that this condition is fulfilled.

First a remark. As 8 and S' are inverses of one another, we shall
have 8 + S' = 0, and consequently 8 + S' + 2 = 2 + S + S' = 2, or
again 2 + 8 + 8' + 2' = 2 + 2' ; but it does not follow that we have
8 -f- 2 -f- S' = 2 ; because, though we have used the addition sign to
represent the succession of our sensations, it is clear that the order of
this succession is not indifferent: we can not, therefore, as in ordinary
addition, invert the order of the terms; to use abridged language, our
operations are associative, but not commutative.

That fixed, in order that 2 and 2' should correspond to the same
point M = M' of the first space, it is necessary and sufficient for us to
have 2' = 2 + o-. We shall then have : 8 + 2' + 8' = 8 + 2 + a +
8' = 8 + 2 + 8' + S + a + S'.

But we have just ascertained that S -f- a -f- 8' was one of the series
</. We shall therefore have : 8 + 2' + S' = 8 + 2 + 8' + a', which
means that the series S + 2' + S' and 8 + 2 + #' correspond to the
same point N = N' of the second space. Q. E. D.

Our two spaces therefore correspond point for point; they can be

84 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

i transformed ' one into the other ; they are isomorphic. How are we
led to conclude thence that they are identical?

Consider the two series a and S -\- <x -\- S' = a. I have said that
often, but not always, the series o- preserves the tactile impression A
felt by the finger D; and similarly it often happens, but not always,
that the series </ preserves the tactile impression A' felt by the ringer
D'. Now I ascertain that it happens very often (that is, much more
often than what I have just called ' often ') that when the series o- has
preserved the impression A of the finger D, the series a preserves at the
same time the impression A' of the finger D' ; and, inversely, that if
the first impression is altered, the second is likewise. That happens
very often, but not always.

We interpret this experimental fact by saying that the unknown
object a which gives the impression A to the finger D is identical with
the unknown object a' which gives the impression A' to the finger D'.
And in fact when the first object moves, which the disappearance of the
impression A tells us, the second likewise moves, since the impression
A' disappears likewise. When the first object remains motionless, the
second remains motionless. If these two objects are identical, as the
first is at the point M of the first space and the second at the point N
of the second space, these two points are identical. This is how we
are led to regard these two spaces as identical; or better this is wbat
we mean when we say that they are identical.

What we have just said of the identity of the two tactile spaces
makes unnecessary our discussing the question of the identity of tactile
space and visual space, which could be treated in the same way.

§ 5. Space and Empiricism

It seems that I am about to be led to conclusions in conformity with
empiristic ideas. I have, in fact, sought to put in evidence the role of
experience and to analyze the experimental facts which intervene in the
genesis of space of three dimensions. But whatever may be the im-
portance of these facts, there is one thing we must not forget and to
which besides I have more than once called attention. These experi-
mental facts are often verified but not always. That evidently does
not mean that space has often three dimensions, but not always.

I know well that it is easy to save oneself and that, if the facts do
not verify, it will be easily explained by saying that the exterior objects
have moved. If experience succeeds, we say that it teaches us about
space ; if it does not succeed, we hie to exterior objects which we accuse
of having moved; in other words, if it does not succeed, it is given a
fillip.

These fillips are legitimate; I do not refuse to admit them; but
they suffice to tell us that the properties of space are not experimental
truths, properly so called. If we had wished to verify other laws, we

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 85

could have succeeded also, by giving other analogous fillips. Should we
not always have been able to justify these fillips by the same reasons?
One could at most have said to us : ' Your fillips are doubtless legiti-
mate, but you abuse them; why move the exterior objects so often? '

To sum up, experience does not prove to us that space has three
dimensions ; it only proves to us that it is convenient to attribute three
to it, because thus the number of fillips is reduced to a minimum.

I will add that experience brings us into contact only with repre-
sentative space, which is a physical continuum, never with geometric
space, which is a mathematical continuum. At the very most it would
appear to tell us that it is convenient to give to geometric space three
dimensions, so that it may have as many as representative space.

The empiric question may be put under another form. Is it im:
possible to conceive physical phenomena, the mechanical phenomena for
example, otherwise than in space of three dimensions ? We should thus
have an objective experimental proof, so to speak, independent of our
physiology, of our modes of representation.

But it is not so ; I shall not here discuss the question completely, I
shall confine myself to recalling the striking example given us by the
mechanics of Hertz. You know that the great physicist did not believe
in the existence of forces, properly so called; he supposed that visible
material points are subjected to certain invisible bonds which join them
to other invisible points and that it is the effect of these invisible bonds
that we attribute to forces.

But that is only a part of his ideas. Suppose a system formed of
n material points, visible or not; that will give in all 3n coordinates;
let us regard them as the coordinates of a single point in space of 3ra
dimensions. This single point would be constrained to remain upon a
surface (of any number of dimensions < 3n) in virtue of the bonds of
which we have just spoken; to go on this surface from one point to
another, it would always take the shortest way; this would be the
single principle which would sum up all mechanics.

Whatever should be thought of this hypothesis, whether we be allured
by its simplicity, or repelled by its artificial character, the simple fact
that Hertz was able to conceive it, and to regard it as more convenient
than our habitual hypotheses, suffices to prove that our ordinary ideas,
and, in particular, the three dimensions of space, are in no wise imposed
upon mechanics with an invincible force.

§ 6. Mind and Space
Experience, therefore, has played only a single role, it has served as
occasion. But this role was none the less very important; and I have
thought it necessary to give it prominence. This role would have been
useless if there existed an a priori form imposing itself upon our sen-
sitivity, and which was space of three dimensions.

86 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Does this form exist, or, if you choose, can we represent to our-
selves space of more than three dimensions? And first what does this
question mean? In the true sense of the word, it is clear that we can
not represent to ourselves space of four, nor space of three, dimensions ;
we can not first represent them to ourselves empty, and no more can we
represent to ourselves an object either in space of four, or in space
of three, dimensions : ( 1 ) Because these spaces are both infinite and we
can not represent to ourselves a figure in space, that is, the part in the
whole, without representing the whole, and that is impossible, because
it is infinite; (2) because these spaces are both mathematical continua
and we can represent to ourselves only the physical continuum; (3)
because these spaces are both homogeneous, and the frames in which
we enclose our sensations, being limited, can not be homogeneous.

Thus the question put can only be understood in another manner;
is it possible to imagine that, the results of the experiences related above
having been different, we might have been led to attribute to space more
than three dimensions; to imagine, for instance, that the sensation of
accommodation might not be constantly in accord with the sensation of
convergence of the eyes; or indeed that the experiences of which we
have spoken in paragraph 2 and of which we express the result by
saying ' that touch does not operate at a distance,' might have led us
to an inverse conclusion.

And then evidently yes that is possible. From the moment one
imagines an experience, one imagines just by that the two contrary
results it may give. That is possible, but that is difficult, because we
have to overcome a multitude of associations of ideas, which are the
fruit of a long personal experience and of the still longer experience of
the race. Is it these associations (or at least those of them that we have
inherited from our ancestors), which constitute this a priori form of
which it is said that we have pure intuition ? Then I do not see why
one should declare it refractory to analysis and should deny me the
right of investigating its origin.

When it is said that our sensations are ' extended ' only one thing
can be meant, that is that they are always associated with the idea of
certain muscular sensations, corresponding to the movements which
enable us to reach the object which causes them, which enable us, in
other words, to defend ourselves against it. And it is just because this
association is useful for the defense of the organism, that it is so old
in the history of the species and that it seems to us indestructible.
Nevertheless, it is only an association and we can conceive that it may
be broken; so that we may not say that sensation can not enter con-
sciousness without entering in space, but that in fact it does not enter
consciousness without entering in space, which means, without being
entangled in this association.

JSTo more can I understand one's saying that the idea of time is log-

TEE VALUE OF SCIENCE . 87

ically subsequent to space, since we can represent it to ourselves only
under the form of a straight line; as well say that time is logically
subsequent to the cultivation of the prairies, since it is usually repre-
sented armed with a scythe. That one can not represent to himself
simultaneously the different parts of time, goes without saying, since
the essential character of these parts is precisely not to be simultaneous.
That does not mean that we have not the intuition of time. So far as
that goes, no more should we have that of space, because neither can
we represent it, in the proper sense of the word, for the reasons 1 have
mentioned. What we represent to ourselves under the name of straight
is a crude image which as ill resembles the geometric straight as it
does time itself.

Why has it been said that every attempt to give a fourth dimension
to space always carries this one back to one of the other three? It is
easy to understand. Consider our muscular sensations and the ' series '
they may form. In consequence of numerous experiences, the ideas
of these series are associated together in a very complex woof, our
series are classed. Allow me, for convenience of language, to express
my thought in a way altogether crude and even inexact by saying that
our series of muscular sensations are classed in three classes correspond-
ing to the three dimensions of space. Of course this classification is
much more complicated than that, but that will suffice to make my
reasoning understood. If I wish to imagine a fourth dimension, I
shall suppose another series of muscular sensations, making part of a
fourth class. But as all my muscular sensations have already been
classed in one of the three preexistent classes, I can only represent to
myself a series belonging to one of these three classes, so that my fourth
dimension is carried back to one of the other three.

What does that prove ? This : that it would have been necessary
first to destroy the old classification and replace it by a new one in
which the series of muscular sensations should have been distributed
into four classes. The difficulty would have disappeared.

It is presented sometimes under a more striking form. Suppose I
am enclosed in a chamber between the six impassable boundaries formed
by the four walls, the floor and the ceiling; it will be impossible for me
to get out and to imagine my getting out. Pardon, can you not
imagine that the door opens, or that two of these walls separate ? But
of course, you answer, one must suppose that these walls remain im-
movable. Yes, but it is evident that I have the right to move; and
then the walls that we suppose absolutely at rest will be in motion
with regard to me. Yes, but such a relative motion can not be any-
thing; when objects are at rest, their relative motion with regard to
any axes is that of a rigid solid; now, the apparent motions that you
imagine are not in conformity with the laws of motion of a rigid solid.

88 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Yes, but it is experience which has taught us the laws of motion of a
rigid solid; nothing would prevent our imagining them different. To
sum up, for me to imagine that I get out of my prison, I have only to
imagine that the walls seem to open, when I move.

I believe, therefore, that if by space is understood a mathematical
continuum of three dimensions, were it otherwise amorphous, it is the
mind which constructs it, but it does not construct it out of nothing;
it needs materials and models. These materials, like these models,
preexist within it. But there is not a single model which is imposed
upon it; it has choice; it may choose, for instance, between space of
four and space of three dimensions. What then is the role of experi-
ence? It gives the indications following which the choice is made.

Another thing: whence does space get its quantitative character?
It comes from the role which the series of muscular sensations play
in its genesis. These are series which may repeat themselves, and it
is from their repetition that number comes; it is because they can
repeat themselves indefinitely that space is infinite. And finally we
have seen, at the end of section 3, that it is also because of this that
space is relative. So it is repetition which has given to space its essen-
tial characteristics; now, repetition supposes time; this is enough to
tell that time is logically anterior to space.

§ 7. Role of the Semicircular Canals
I have not hitherto spoken of the role of certain organs to which
the physiologists attribute with reason a capital importance, I mean
the semicircular canals. Numerous experiments have sufficiently
shown that these canals are necessary to our sense of orientation; but
the physiologists are not entirely in accord; two opposing theories have
been proposed, that of Mach-Delage and that of M. de Cyon.

M. de Cyon is a physiologist who has made his name illustrious by
important discoveries on the innervation of the heart; I can not, how-
ever agree with his ideas on the question before us. Not being a physi-
ologist, I hesitate to criticize the experiments he has directed against
the adverse theory of Mach-Delage; it seems to me, however, that they
are not convincing, because in many of them the total pressure was
made to vary in one of the canals, while, physiologically, what varies
is the difference between the pressures on the two extremities of the
canal; in others the organs were subjected to profound lesions, which
must alter their functions.

Besides, this is not important; the experiments, if they were irre-
proachable, might be convincing against the old theory. They would
not be convincing for the new theory. In fact, if I have rightly under-
stood the theory, my explaining it will be enough for one to understand
that it is impossible to conceive of an experiment confirming it.

THE VALVE OF SCIENCE 89

The three pairs of canals would have as sole function to tell us that
space has three dimensions. Japanese mice have only two pairs of
canals; they believe, it would seem, that space has only two dimensions,
and they manifest this opinion in the strongest way; they put them-
selves in a circle, and, so ordered, they spin rapidly around. The
lampreys, having only one pair of canals, believe that space has only
one dimension, but their manifestations are less turbulent.

It is evident that such a theory is inadmissible. The sense-organs
are designed to tell us of changes which happen in the exterior world.
We could not understand why the Creator should have given us organs
destined to cry without cease : Eemember that space has three dimen-
sions, since the number of these three dimensions is not subject to
change.

We must, therefore, come back to the thory of Mach-Delage. What
the nerves of the canals can tell us is the difference of pressure on the
two extremities of the same canal, and thereby: (1) the direction of
the vertical with regard to three axes rigidly bound to the head; (2)
the three components of the acceleration of translation of the center
of gravity of the head; (3) the centrifugal forces developed by the
rotation of the head; (4) the acceleration of the motion of rotation
of the head.

It follows from the experiments of M. Delage that it is this last
indication which is much the most important; doubtless because the
nerves are less sensible to the difference of pressure itself than to the
brusque variations of this difference. The first three indications may
thus be neglected.

Knowing the acceleration of the motion of rotation of the head at
each instant, we deduce from it, by an unconscious integration, the
final orientation of the head, referred to a certain initial orientation
taken as origin. The circular canals contribute, therefore, to inform
us of the movements that we have executed, and that on the same
ground as the muscular sensations. When, therefore, above we speak
of the series S or of the series 2, we should say, not that these were
series of muscular sensations alone, but that they were series at the
same time of muscular sensations due to the semicircular canals.
Apart from this addition, we should have nothing to change in what
precedes.

In the series 8 and 2, these sensations of the semicircular canals
evidently hold a very important place. Yet alone they would not
suffice, because they can tell us only of the movements of the head;
they tell us nothing of the relative movements of the body, or of the
members in regard to the head. And more, it seems that they tell us
only of the rotations of the head and not of the translations it may
undergo.

NOBEL MEDALS

The gold medals conferred in connection with the Nobel prizes are here
shown. Above is the medal in physics and in chemistry. The obverse of the
medals in medicine and in literature is the same; the reverse of each of these
medals is shown beneath. At the bottom is the medal for the promotion of
peace.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

THE PEOGEESS OF SCIENCE

THE KOBEL PRIZES
The great prizes established by the
will of Alfred Nobel were awarded for
the sixth time on December 10, the
anniversary of the death of the
founder, as follows: Physics, Professor
J. J. Thomson of Cambridge; chem-
istry, M. Moissan of Paris; medicine,
Professor S. Ramon y Cajal of Madrid
and Professor Camillo Golgi of Pavia;
literature, Professor Giosue Carducci
of Bologna; for the promotion of peace
among nations, President Roosevelt.
These international awards, of the
value of about $40,000, are of suf-
ficient magnitude not only to be of
interest to scientific men, but also to
attract the attention of the civilized
world. They are thus a real factor
in increasing the dignity of the scien-
tific career and in encouraging scien-
tific work.

Regret has already been expressed
here that the confidence placed by
Nobel in his native land has not been
justified. His large fortune was made
in Great Britain by the discovery and
manufacture of dynamite, and it seems
likely that the instructions of his will
would have been more adequately car-
ried out if their execution had been
entrusted to the Royal Society and the
British courts. Nobel doubtless be-
lieved that the international obliga-
tions would be fully met by the
Scandinavian countries, and it is truly
sad and discouraging that there should
be lack of good faith in the adminis-
tration of a fund intended as the
testator states ' to benefit mankind.'

Nobel's will is perfectly clear and
explicit. It directs that the interest
from the fund ' shall be divided into
five equal parts,' which shall be an-
nually awarded in prizes to those

persons who shall have contributed
most materially to benefit mankind
during the year immediately preceding.
" One share to the person who shall
have made the most important dis-
covery or invention in the domain of
physics; one share to the person who
shall have made the most important
chemical discovery or improvement;
one share to the person who shall have
made the most important discovery in
the domain of physiology or medicine;
one share to the person who shall have
produced in the field of literature the
most distinguished work of an ideal-
istic tendency, and, finally, one share
to the person who shall have most or
best promoted the fraternity of nations
and the abolishment or diminution of
standing armies and the formation and
increase of peace congresses."

In face of these explicit directions
statutes have been drawn up, appar-
ently with the sanction of the King
of Sweden and others high in au-
thority, providing that only sixty per
cent, of the income need be used for
the prizes and that they need be
awarded only once in five years. The
balance of the income — except perhaps
in the case of the prize for the promo-
tion of peace, regarding which infor-
mation is lacking — is now used for
the support of certain laboratories and
libraries at Stockholm. These are
doubtless needed, possibly more than
the prizes established by Nobel, but
they have been founded in dishonor.
The clause establishing the laboratory
of physics and chemistry is unpleas-
antly disingenuous. It says that it is
to be " established primarily for the
purpose of carrying out, where the re-
spective Nobel committees shall deem
requisite, scientific investigation as to
the value of those discoveries in the

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

domains of physics and chemistry
which shall have been proposed as
meriting the award of Nobel prize to
their authors. The institute shall,
moreover, as far as its means allow,
promote such researches in the do-
mains of the sciences named as
promise to result in salient advan-
tage." The prizes have so far been
awarded annually, but it is to be
feared that when the money is needed
in Sweden, it will be kept there in
accordance with the provision of the
statutes that when a prize is not
awarded the money may be used for
funds ' to promote the objects which
the testator ultimately had in view
in making his bequest in other ways
than by means of prizes.'

The administrators of the Nobel
foundation have violated the condi-
tions of the bequest in other ways
which, though not so discreditable as
the conveying of the money to local
purposes and men, can not be regarded
as justifiable. Nobel expressly stipu-
lates that the prizes shall be awarded
to those " who shall have contributed
most materially to benefit mankind
during the year immediately preced-
ing." The statutes hedge, as follows:
" By the proviso in the will to the
effect that for the prize competition
only such works or inventions shall be
eligible as have appeared ' during the
preceding year ' is to be understood
that a work or invention for which a
reward under the terms of the will is
contemplated shall set forth the most
modern results of work being done in
that of the departments, as defined
in the will, to which it belongs; works
or inventions of older standing to be
taken into consideration only in case
their importance has not previously
been demonstrated."

In no single case has the award
been made for work accomplished or
published during the preceding year.
The prizes have been given to men of
eminence, most of whom accomplished
their important work long ago. It
would certainly be difficult to select

each year the work most beneficial to
mankind, and mistakes would un-
doubtedly be made; but the effort to
make such a selection and to award
the prize without regard to national-
ity, age or eminence would be a great
stimulus to research, far greater prob-
ably than the methods adopted. But
the question is not which method is
the better, but for what purposes
Nobel made his bequest. The terms of
the will have also been violated by
dividing the prizes and by awarding
them to institutions, and its spirit has
been especially ignored by giving the
power of nomination and determina-
tion chiefly to Swedes. It does not of
course follow that the dead hand
should forever control. But Nobel
died only ten years ago. He might
be given his will for a little while at
least, and under the special circum-
stances of the case it would seem only
just to submit any provisions which
proved impracticable or unwise to in-
ternational consideration.

There is a certain lack of courtesy
in thus criticizing actions sanctioned
by the Swedish government and by
those Swedish men of science at least
who are accepting gratuities from the
fund. Neither can we as a nation
regard ourselves as fit to cast stones
when we remember the histories of the
Stewart, Tilden and other bequests, or
when we consider that the Smith-
sonian Institution, established by a
foreigner ' for the increase and dif-
fusion of knowledge among men ' has
been used largely for the promotion
of local interests. But it is only by
frankly considering these things that
we may learn that honor is more than
great riches.

TEE SCIENTIFIC MEETINGS OF
CONVOCATION WEEK
The American Association for the
Advancement of Science and the na-
tional scientific societies affiliated with
it hold their annual meeting this year
in New York City, beginning on De-
cember 27. Washington and New York

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

The Library of Columbia University.

are now our two main scientific cen-
ters, there being in each city about
five hundred men engaged in research
work. The first of the convocation

ton four years ago, with an attendance
estimated at 1,500 members, and there
is good reason to suppose that the
present meeting will be even larger and

week meetings was held in Washing- i more wide reaching in its effects on the

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The School of Mines, Columbia University. This building has just been completed.
In the foreground is the house used by the Faculty Club.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Earl Hall, Columbia University. This building is the headquarters of the
American Association and the affiliated societies.

advancement and diffusion of science.

It is not possible in this note to give
a statement even of the main features
of the programs. The American As-
sociation meets in ten sections, each
with its own presiding officers and its
program of papers and discussions last-
ing several days. There are further
about twenty national societies which
meet in affiliation, sometimes holding
joint sessions with the sections of the
association or with one another and
sometimes meeting separately. These
societies, which include those devoted
to astronomy, physics, mathematics,
chemistry, geology, geography, zoology,
entomology, bacteriology, physiology,
anatomy, botany, psychology, philos-
ophy and anthropology, each has its
independent organization and officers,
so it is obvious that the programs are
extensive. There will be at least five
hundred papers read, which when pub-
lished in detail will fill more than ten
thousand pages.

The high character and broad in-
terest of the proceedings may be briefly
but adequately shown by a list of some
of the retiring or presiding officers,
most of whom will make addresses.
Every one familiar with science in
America will understand that they
represent the best work now being ac-

complished. These officers include:
Professor W. H. Welch of the Johns
Hopkins University, Professor C. M.
Woodward of Washington University,
Professor William James of Harvard
University, Professor Charles B. Daven-
port of the Cold Spring Biological
Laboratory, Professor E. C. Pickering
of the Harvard College Observatory,
Professor Carl Barus of Brown Uni-
versity, Professor W. F. Osgood of Har-
vard University, Dr. W. F. Hillebrand
of the U. S. Geological Survey, Mr. C.
C. Adams of New York City, Professor
W. E. Castle of Harvard University,
Mr. A. H. Kirtland of Maiden, Mass.,
Professor Erwin F. Smith of the U.
S. Department of Agriculture, Pro-
fessor W. H. Howell of the Johns Hop-
kins University, Professor Franklin P.
Mall of the Johns Hopkins University,
Dr. F. S. Earle of Herradura, Cuba,
Professor J. R. Angell of the Univer-
sity of Chicago, Professor F. W. Put-
nam of Harvard University, Professor
John F. Woodhull of Teachers' College,
Columbia University, Professor Edward
Kasner of Columbia University, Pro-
fessor W. C. Sabine of Harvard Uni-
versity, Mr. Clifford Richardson of
New York City, Mr. W. R. Warner of
Cleveland, Ohio, Dr. A. C. Lane of the
Michigan Geological Survey, Professor

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

Edwin G. Conklin of the University of | for phagocytosis. The method of de-
Pennsylvania, Dr. D. T. MacDongal of
the Carnegie Institution, Mr. Charles
A. Conant of New York City, and Dr.
Simon Flexner of the Rockefeller In-
stitute for Medical Research.

Most of the meetings will be held at
Columbia University, but there will
also be sessions at the American
Museum of Natural History, The
Rockefeller Institute for Medical Re-
search, the College of the City of New
York, the New York Botanical Garden
and elsewhere. These and other scien-
tific institutions of the city have in
recent years made extraordinary prog-
ress. There is here only space to show
several of the buildings of Columbia
University, which, having removed to
its new site overlooking the city of
New York only ten years ago, has
now a group of academic buildings in
many respects unequalled.

THE OPSONIC INDEX OF WRIGHT
AND DOUGLAS
Sir Almroth E. Wright, M.D.,
F.R.S., pathologist to St. Mary's Hos-
pital, London, and late professor of
pathology, Army Medical School, Net-
ley, delivered the third course of lec-
tures on the Herter foundation in the
Physiological Building of Johns Hop-
kins Medical School on October 8, 9
and 10, 1906. The subject chosen was
' The therapeutic inoculation of bac-
terial vaccines and its application in
connection with the treatment of bac-
terial disease.' As this subject is an
important elaboration of Metchnikoff's
work upon phagocytosis and of Ehr-
lich's side-chain theory, it may not be
out of place briefly to outline from
these lectures Wright's method and to
cite a few illustrative cases showing

termining the opsonic index is as fol-
lows: About five cubic centimeters of
blood is withdrawn from a healthy per-
son under aseptic conditions by prick-
ing the finger. This blood is then placed
in a glass tube (A), slightly heated to
facilitate clotting, and centrifugalized
so as to separate the serum from the
clot. In a second tube (B) is placed
about the same amount of blood, to
which is added sodium-citrate solution
in order to prevent clotting. By cen-
trifugalizing this there are obtained
three layers, i. e., serum, white cor-
puscles and red corpuscles. The serum
it pipetted off and the solution contain-
ing leucocytes at once becomes easi'y
accessible. A third tube (C) contains
an aqueous solution of tubercle bacilli.
This is also centrifugalized in order to
get a fine suspension. Equal quanti-
ties of the serum of a healthy person
(A) ; of white blood corpuscles (B) ;
and of a tubercle bacilli solution (V)
are drawn into a capillary tube and
freely mixed. They are then placed
in an incubator for twenty minutes. A
film is next made and stained by any
cf the well-known methods of staining
for tubercle bacilli. Then the exact
number of bacilli found to be present
in thirty consecutive multinuclear leu-
cocytes are counted by the aid of an
oil-immersion lens — call it in this case
X. The process is now repeated, sub-
stituting the blood of a patient for the
blood of the healthy person, the white
corpuscles and aqueous tubercle solu-
tion remaining constant in both esti-
mations. The result obtained by count-
ing these latter may be called Y; in
that case the opsonic index of the pa-
tient's blood is expressed thus, Y/X,
which is usually a decimal. The en-

the value of this mode of procedure in tire process occupies about one hour

the treatment of certain bacterial dis- and a quarter in the hands of an expe-

eases by vaccines. rienced laboratory worker.

The term opsonin, meaning ' to pre- The surgeon's idea of curing bac-

pare for a meal,' is given to a recently terial diseases, such as scrofulous

discovered and important constituent glands of the neck, seems too often to

of both normal and immune sera, by be that of extirpation, though he does

means of which bacteria are prepared often employ instead of the knife

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

various recent methods of treatment,
such as Rontgen rays, Finsen's light,
radium and Bier's passive hyperemia.
The ideal treatment, however, of bac-
terial disease is to put into the blood
a substance, like an antiseptic, which
will kill the bacteria or neutralize
their toxines, but which will not injure
the tissues with which it is brought
in contact. This has been done to a
certain extent by the antitoxin of diph-
theria, but there has not been discov-
ered, up to the present time, a scien-
tific and exact method by means of
which the therapeutic use of such
agents as tuberculin could be controlled
in order that the smallest amount of
detriment possible might ensue to the
patient during the course of the treat-
ment. That there exists a certain sub-
stance in the serum of the blood which
is capable of aiding phagocytosis, is
shown by the history of a case cited
by Wright in which there was a condi-
tion of furunculosis (boils) due to
staphylococci. The patient's serum, his
corpuscles and an emulsification of dead
staphylococci gave a count of 26 ; while
the patient's serum, the corpuscles from
a normal person and the emulsion,
gave 27 ; the normal serum, the normal
corpuscles and the emulsion, gave 13;
the normal serum, the patient's cor-
puscles and the emulsion also giving
13. This would show that the corpus-
cular elements had nothing to do with
the increased number of staphylococci
which were taken up by the leucocytes
and would show that the property of
increasing the nrmber of staphylococci
in the leucocytes is to be attributed to
the so-called opsonin in the serum itself.
By using this index after the injec-
tion of the vaccine, it will be seen that
there is usually a slight decrease in the
opsonic index, followed by a marked
secondary rise; though if the dose be
too large or a second dose be adminis-
tered too quickly, this secondary rise
may not occur at all. The interesting
fact was brought out by Wright in his
lectures that a surgical operation, or

even massage, or sitting up in bed, may
cause a similar reaction in a tubercu-
lous foci. The disadvantage of secur-
ing the reaction by these methods is
that live tubercle bacilli may be intro-
duced into the blood stream and that
their lodgment and subsequent multi-
plication may take place. Dr. Wright
is so sanguine of the success of this
mode of treatment that he believes that
every case of localized tuberculosis may
be now cured by the proper use of the
vaccines of tuberculosis.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS
A meeting to commemorate the life
and service of Samuel Pierpont Lang-
ley, secretary of the Smithsonian In-
stitution from 1887 to 1906, was held
in the lecture room of the United
States National Museum on December
3. The following addresses were de-
livered : ' Introductory Remarks,' by
the chancellor of the Smithsonian In-
stitution, the Honorable Melville W.
Fuller, chief justice of the United
States ; ' Memorial on Behalf of the
Board of Regents,' by the Honorable
Andrew D. White, LL.D.; 'Mr. Lang-
ley's Contributions to Astronomy and
Astrophysics,' by Professor E. C. Pick-
ering, director of the Harvard College
Observatory ; ' Mr. Langley's Contribu-
tions to Aerodynamics,' by Octave
Chanute, Esq., of Chicago.

Dr. Henry Fairfield Osborn, Da
Costa professor of zoology in Columbia
University, curator of vertebrate pale-
ontology and vice-president of the
American Museum of Natural History,
geologist and paleontologist of the U.
S. Geological Survey, has declined the
secretaryship of the Smithsonian In-
stitution to which he was elected by
the regents on December 4. — Dr. An-
drew Fleming West, professor of Latin
at Princeton University and dean of
the graduate school, has declined the
olfer of the executive committee of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
to nominate him for the presidency.

VOL. LXX. — 7.

/f»6

Professor of Physics, Cornell University, President of the American Association

for the Advancement of Science.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

FEBRUARY, 1907

GLACIAL EBOSION IN ALASKA1

By Professor RALPH S. TARR

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

TTT HEN" Henry Gannett made the statement that " thousands of
v ' cubic miles " of rock had been removed from the fiords of south-
eastern Alaska by glacial erosion, and that " the relief features of this
region, its mountains and its gorges partly filled by the sea, are all of
glacial origin," - it is probable that many readers had the feeling that
he had greatly exaggerated the case of glacial erosion. For my own
part, I distinctly remember reading this with the feeling that, although
glaciers are unquestionably capable of doing great work of erosion, it
would require the most convincing evidence to satisfy me of even the
approximate accuracy of this statement. Having now made four
trips over a part of the route upon which Mr. Gannett based his
statements, and having examined the phenomena attentively, there and
elsewhere, I have the conviction that in reality his statement of the
case is in close harmony with the truth. It is the purpose of this paper
to state the argument upon which this conclusion is based.

It is a well-known fact that it is possible to go from Seattle to
Sitka, along a series of ' Channels/ i Canals ' and ' Reaches ' without
once entering the open ocean. In addition to this unique ' Inside
Passage' of upwards of 1,000 miles, there is a maze of branches of
such enormous extent that the whole system of channels has not yet
been charted. Everywhere these arms of the sea are enclosed between

1 Published by permission of the Director of the U. S. Geological Survey. I
am indebted to Lawrence Martin and 0. von Engeln, members of my expeditions,
for photographic work, as indicated under the illustrations, and to Mr. Martin
and B. S. Butler for valuable assistance in my field investigations.

2Harriman Alaska Expedition, Vol. II., History, Geography, Resources,
1902, pp. 258-259.

IOO

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 1. Aligned Spurs, Inside Passage. Three such spurs seen on the right, the most
distant one showing the change in slope. Two shown on the left, with the change in slope
plainly visible in the more distant one. From such a condition as this there is every gradation
to straight walled ' canals ' Photograph by O. von Engeln.

mountain walls, and in many places they have the characteristics of
grand fiords.

Such a topography as this has, until recently, been quite generally
explained as a result of subsidence of the land, by which the lower
ends of the land valleys have been drowned by the admission of the
sea water into them. In this way the irregular coast of Patagonia, the
fiords of Norway, and other similar coast lines have been explained.

Under ordinary conditions, the development of valleys by stream
erosion produces certain characteristic features which are easily recog-
nizable. These features are well understood by physiographers and
have been fully stated on many occasions, and especially by Professor
Davis, to whom, more than to any other, we owe our clear recognition
of them and their application to the problems of glacial erosion.

One of these features is the cross-section of the valley, which varies
in width and steepness according to the stage of its development. A
young stream valley is steep-sided and gorge-like. Its width is narrow
in proportion to its depth. A mature valley, having long been exposed
to action of the weather, has been broadened out by the weathering
back of the valley walls so that its width is great as compared with its

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA

IOI

depth. For a stream valley to pass from youth to maturity, even
under the most favorable conditions, requires a great lapse of time.

The form of river valley to be expected in such a mountainous coun-
try as the coast of British Columbia and Alaska, would therefore
depend largely upon the length of time that the streams had been work-
ing to cut the valleys. Had the stream action been brief, we should
expect to find profound gorges; had it been long, broader valleys and
the more gentle slopes of maturity. If, as is the case in Alaska, the
same valleys have some of the characteristics of youth and some of
maturity, a special explanation must be sought.

A second characteristic which results from the normal develop-
ment of stream valleys is the accordance in grade between main and
tributary streams. No matter how fast the main stream may be
lowering its valley, even though it be a Colorado Eiver, the side
streams, including even weak tributaries, lower their mouths at ap-
proximately the same rate that the main stream deepens its valley.
This feature is so well established as a normal condition of valley
development, that it may be stated as a law that, under normal condi-
tions of stream development, tributary valleys enter main valleys ap-
proximately at grade. That this is not the case in many instances in
Alaska will be shown below.

A third feature normally developed during the formation of stream
valleys is that of a somewhat winding course with overlapping spurs,
alternating first on one side then on the other. Because of this

Fig. 2. Large Tributary Valley entering Grenville Channel from the East,
below the Sea Level. Note steepened lower slope on left side of tributary valley. Photo-
graph by Lawrence Martin.

102

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 3. Hanging Valley in Grenville Channel, Inside Passage. Waterfall of stream
draining the broad, U-shaped valley seen near water in right-hand half of picture. Photo-
graph by Lawrence Martin.

feature a view up or down such a valley is not usually very extensive,
being cut off by the projecting spurs around which the stream swings.
The absence of this feature in those Alaskan valleys where there is a

Fig. 4 Waterfall on the Very Face of the Rock Lip of a Hanging Valley behind
Sara Island, Inside Passage. Photograph by Lawrence Martin.

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA 103

discordance in the other directions mentioned above, calls for ex-
planation.

The partial submergence of a region traversed by a series of val-
leys with the characteristics just stated, would produce results which
can be readily and accurately predicted. The line up to which the
new sea level reached would be rendered irregular for two reasons.
In the first place, the overlapping spurs would introduce a winding
coast line in the fiords, with capes on one side opposite reentrants on
the other. In the second place, since the tributary valleys joined the
main valleys at grade, the sea water would enter their mouths and thus
transform their lower portions to bays.

Examining the actual conditions along the Inside Passage to
Alaska, we find very wide departures from this postulated result of a
drowning of normal land valleys. Many of the passages are in the
form of long straight ' Peaches ' and ' Canals,' up and down which one
can look for miles without obstruction to the view. In other cases the
' Reaches/ though not perfectly straight, have alternating projections
and reentrants (Fig. 1). These, however, depart from typical over-
lapping spurs in two important respects. In the first place, they are
much less pronounced. In the second place, instead of having a uni-
form slope from the crest to the tip of the spurs, they have a moderate
slope above, like that of ordinary valley spurs, but terminate on the
water side in a steep and even precipitous slope. They have the ap-
pearance, therefore, of being truncated valley spurs; and a view
through such a channel often shows a succession of these partial
spurs with the truncated faces in alignment. The general appearance
of these aligned spurs suggests that some powerful rasping agent has
moved through the fiord and truncated the overlapping spurs back to
a fairly uniform distance.

The fiords of the Inside Passage furnish all gradations from typical
overlapping spurs to aligned spurs, and to straight, smoothed i Canals '
from which all semblance of spurs has been erased. In the latter case
the valley walls themselves often possess a double slope, steep and
even precipitous below, more gentle above. The steepened lower slope
has the appearance of having been incised in a valley whose remnant
is represented by the upper more gentle slope.

In those ' Peaches ' which are long and straight, and in those with
aligned spurs, the tributary valleys enter the main valley at very differ-
ent levels. Some, especially the larger, enter below the level of the
sea, and in these cases there are bays in their mouths (Fig. 2) ; many
others have their mouths high above the fiord level (Figs. 3, 4 and 5).
Although there is no uniform height at which these side valleys enter
the main trough, in general it is true that, the smaller the tributary
valley, the higher its mouth lies above the main valley bottom. These
are called hanging valleys because their mouths hang above the bottom

io4

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 5. Hanging Valley, Grenville Channel, Inside Passage. The forest-covered lip
is solid rock, but it looks like a dam. Doubtless if one went to the crest of this lip he would
find the broad valley extending, with moderate grade up the distant mountain. Note the
waterfall near center of picture. Photograph by Lawrence Martin.

of the main valley to which they are tributary, instead of entering at
grade, as is normal.

Where these Alaskan hanging valleys are most typically developed,
the appearance is quite remarkable. The valley wall of the long,
straight ' Beach ' or ' Canal ' is broken by a broad U-shaped tributary
valley, whose cross section, if explained by ordinary methods of valley
formation, would require a long period of time for its formation.
The stream occupying the hanging valley flows with moderate grade
up to the point where the tributary valley is intersected by the straight
wall of the main i Beach.' Then, instead of continuing into the main
valley with the same grade, it tumbles over the lip of the hanging valley
and descends to the fiord in a succession of leaps, sometimes on the
very face of the main valley wall (Fig. 4), sometimes in a shallow
gorge (Figs. 3 and 5).

In these most typical cases, there is such an absolute discordance
of conditions as to cause comment from even the most casual observers,
as I had occasion to observe in many instances in sailing through the
Inside Passage. The first feature to attract attention was the water-
fall. It was then noticed that the stream emerged from a broad valley,
far up which one could look, though without seeing its bottom (Figs.
3-5). This produced the impression that the lip of the hanging
valley was really a dam across the mouth of a broad tributary valley.

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA

*°5

This deceptive appearance was so striking that, on asking fellow voy-
agers for an explanation of the hanging valleys, I have again and
again received the answer that the mouth of the valley has been
dammed and a lake formed behind it. So apparent is this explanation
that the captain of the steamer stated positively that there are always
lakes behind these lips.

Thus the hanging valley is so abnormal a feature that even to
ordinary observers it seems to demand some special explanation. That
there are lakes in some of the hanging valleys is probable; but it is not
a necessary condition. The lip is not a dam; it is unconsumed rock in
a valley bottom that has been left high above the main valley by ex-
ceptional conditions which have deepened the main trough. It was of
course impossible to stop and go into the many hanging valleys which
we passed in the Inside Passage, but farther up the coast I was able to
enter such valleys and prove, what I was well aware of before, that the
lip is not a dam and that lakes form no necessary part of the hanging-
valley condition (see Figs. 7 and 8).

Two other features of the valleys in the Inside Passage are note-
worthy. One is the fact that in both the main and tributary valleys
the rock walls have been smoothed and rounded by glacial action, prov-
ing the former extension of glaciers through this series of ' Keaches.'
The other is the remarkably uniform cross-section of both the main
and tributary valleys, as is so well illustrated in many of the accompany-

Fig. 6. A Hanging Valley on the South Side of Xunatak Fiord. This valley lies
on the same side, but about a mile west of the succeeding pictures (Figs. 7, 8 and 9). The float-
ing ice is from Nunatak glacier about four miles distant. Photograph by Lawrence Martin.

io6

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ing photographs. They are distinctly U-shaped with smooth and
regular walls. In spite of their breadth, which is a normal charac-
teristic of mature valleys, the enclosing walls, especially in the lower
portions, are oftentimes exceedingly steep and even precipitous, a char-
acteristic of young, not of mature, stream valleys. Thus the same
valley has the characteristics of two stages of development, the breadth
of maturity and the steep-sidedness of youth.

It is evident that such conditions as those which characterize so
many of the valleys of the Inside Passage can not be due to normal
conditions of stream valley development. The discrepancies and anom-
alies are altogether too numerous and striking for such an explanation.

Fig. 7. The Rock Lip of a Hanging Valley Just West of the Nunatak in Nunatak
Fiord. There is a vertical difference of 700 feet between the camera site and the lip of the
valley. Photographs 9 and 10 were taken from this lip. Photograph by O. von Engeln.

If this is true of the origin of the valley forms, it follows that the
present outline of the intricate maze of channels on this coast cannot
be explained as a result of the drowning of normal stream-made val-
leys, as has been so universally believed to be the case.

It is now quite generally admitted that some of the features which
characterize the 'Peaches' of the Inside Passage do not admit of ex-
planation as a result of normal stream work. The feature that has
been most uniformly admitted, to be abnormal is that of discordance of
tributary and main valleys. The explanation of this hanging valley
condition as a result of glacial erosion, which this paper is supporting,
is not, however, so uniformly accepted; the chief objection of those who
have not yet accepted it being their belief that glaciers are incompetent
to perform such great work as would be required if hanging valleys are

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA

107

explained in this way. In consequence of this inability to accept the
conclusion that glaciers are powerful agents of erosion, a number of
alternate hypotheses have been suggested, of which the following are
some of the most prominent.

One of these special explanations is based upon the conception that
glaciers act to protect rather than to erode. This explanation assumes
that glaciers occupied and protected the tributary valleys while the
main valleys were free from ice, and that, while this condition lasted,
the main valleys were so deepened that, when the ice finally melted from
the protected tributary valleys, they were hanging well above the over-
deepened main troughs. When it is considered that thousands of
hanging valleys are already known, and that in each case it was neces-
sary for a small glacier to linger with its terminus at the very lip

Fig. 8. Looking into Hanging Valley (Fig. 7) from Rock Lip at Elevation of 7°0
Feet. The stream flows in a small gorge at the right. The elevation in the middle background
of the valley is the moraine-covered terminus of a dwindling glacier. The valley floor is all
rock, and rock extends continuously across its mouth. Photograph by O. von Engeln.

of the hanging valley throughout the long period of time required
to deepen the main channel, this explanation seems almost too
absurd to consider. It furthermore fails to account for the aligned
spurs, and, above all, for the great breadth and U-shape of fche
main troughs. While one might admit this as a possible cause for
individual cases, it fails utterly as a general explanation.

A second hypothesis proposed, is that glacial erosion is lateral
rather than vertical, and that the hanging valleys are due to the wear-
ing back of the tributary mouths so that they are left hanging. That

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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

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GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA 109

there is marked lateral erosion is generally admitted by all believers
in glacial erosion; but that this is the dominant form of glacial erosion
would require for its acceptance much better evidence than has been
presented. It may fairly be asked, if there is such pronounced lateral
erosion, why should there not also be vertical erosion of equal or greater
amount? Even if excessive lateral erosion should be granted as a
possibility, of which there is no proof, it alone would fail to account for
all the conditions observed. It would fail to explain why remnants of
valley spurs are left side by side with pronounced hanging valleys; for
in such cases the spurs should certainly be rubbed completely away.
But, even more fatal than this is the fact that if the grade of the
hanging valley is projected out into the main valley, it will, in a vast
number of cases, fall far short of meeting the main valley at grade.
Consequently, if glacial erosion is admitted at all, the element of ver-
tical erosion must be granted as a prominent part of the process.

A third explanation proposed for the hanging-valley condition
is that of capture and diversion of tributary streams. No one would
deny that the diversion of a stream by capture might leave it hanging
above the valley to which it was originally tributary. But to attempt
to apply • such an explanation to the multitude of known cases of
hanging valleys would not be so generally accepted. It would require
a marvelous development of stream capture in special localities and,
strangely enough, almost entirely in regions of former glaciation.
Before this hypothesis could be seriously considered as a general ex-
planation of hanging valleys, it would be necessary to account for the
fact that this process has operated so extensively in glaciated regions,
whereas it so rarely operates in unglaciated countries. But even if this
explanation were otherwise probable for hanging valleys, it still leaves
unexplained the associated phenomena of aligned spurs, steepened lower
slopes and general U-shape of the main troughs.

A fourth hypothesis proposed is that of rejuvenation. By this it
is assumed that the main and lateral valleys had an accordance of
grade during an earlier cycle of development, but that recent uplift, or
other cause, gave to the streams a new power of cutting, making them
young again, or rejuvenating them. As a result of this there was
rapid cutting, the main streams working much faster than the laterals
and leaving them hanging. This explanation is totally inadequate for
the Alaskan conditions. It fails to account for the truncated spurs;
it gives no explanation of the difference in level at which the laterals
are hanging; and, moreover, even if it operated, it could not possibly
produce the other results observed. Such rejuvenation would not
develop a broad main valley, but a narrow gorge. But, even if we were
to admit, which physiographers would not, that such deepening and
broadening of the main valley would be possible without corresponding
deepening at the mouths of the laterals, it is inconceivable that, during

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

all the time required for the deepening and broadening of the main
trough, the lateral stream was scarcely able to even scratch the lip of
the hanging valley (Fig. 4). This point may be illustrated by a
specific case, taken not from the Inside Passage, but from Nunatak
Fiord, a branch of the Yakutat Bay Inlet which lies about midway
between Sitka and Controller Bay just southeast of Mount St. Elias.
This fiord has been so recently occupied by ice that vegetation,
excepting scattered annual plants, has not yet been able to take hold
on the soil. The Nunatak Glacier (Fig. II) has receded up this fiord
more than a mile in ten years. Unquestionably there has been power-
ful glacial erosion here, for the walls of the fiord are smoothed and
grooved by glacial grinding, and there are no valley spurs left. Several
of the valleys tributary to the fiord are hanging high above it (Figs. 6

Fig. 10. Looking Across the Mouth of Disenchantment Bay, Russell Valley (Fig. 11)
on Left. This valley is hanging at about sea level. A small valley to the right of this hangs
fully 1.000 feet above sea level. A somewhat larger valley ■ n the extreme right of the picture
is hanging at a level intermediate between these two. To account for such discordance by
faulting would demand very complex block faulting. But the rock walls of the fiord are
plainly exposed and there is no evidence of it. Photograph by O. von Engeln.

and 7), and in all the larger of these small glaciers are still present.
The entire absence of forest exposes the conditions here far more clearly
than is the case along the forest-clothed Inside Passage.

Viewed from the fiord, the hanging valley selected for this illus-
tration is plainly seen to be a broad, U-shaped trough heading well
back in the mountains and with a small glacier at its head. Tbe
wide open mouth of this broad valley is truncated by the straight, steep
rock wall of Nunatak Fiord and left perched high above even its water

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA in

surface. This valley wall extends completely across the mouth of the
hanging valley, forming a rock lip seven hundred feet high (Fig. 7).
Climbing to the crest of this lip, one is able to look up the hanging
valley to its mountain-walled head (Fig 8). It is found to be a broad,
U-shaped valley with a flat floor and moderate grade.

The ice-born stream which flows along the bottom of this valley
has cut only a shallow trench in the rock floor, through which it flows
with moderate grade until the lip of the hanging valley is reached,
when its grade abruptly increases and it tumbles down the main valley
wall, as a succession of waterfalls, in the bottom of a gorge so shallow
that the entire series of cascades, from the crest of the lip to its
bottom, is plainly visible from the fiord. The stream has begun to
lower its grade to harmonize with the main valley; but it has not had
time yet to carry the process very far. That there is no possibility of
the presence of a drift-filled valley of earlier date is proved by the
fact that bed rock outcrops across the entire lip.

On any assumption of stream rejuvenation, it is utterly incredible
that all the time required to deepen the main trough of Nunatak Fiord,
and to broaden it into the form of maturity which it possesses (Figs.
9 and 14), should have been too short to have permitted the stream in
the hanging valley to cut a more profound gorge, on such a steep slope,
and to attain a better approximation to that accordance of grades toward
which all tributaries tend in their relation to the main streams. Wher-
ever one critically examines a hanging valley in its relation to the
main trough, the same conclusion is necessitated.

A fifth explanation that has been proposed is faulting. It is of
course admitted that a block fault, by dropping down the bottom of a
main valley, would leave the tributary valleys hanging. Although
admitted as a possibility for individual cases, the application of such
an explanation to Alaskan conditions in general, fails utterly to account
for the facts. It would not explain the truncated spurs on both sides,
nor the U-shape of the main and lateral valleys. Furthermore, with-
out the introduction of complicated secondary faulting, it would not
account for the difference in level at which the valleys hang above the
main trough to which they are tributary (Fig. 10). Another fact which
ordinary block faulting would fail to explain is the frequent presence
of a condition of double hanging valleys, — a lateral hanging above the
main valley, and a tributary of this lateral hanging above it.

Such a condition of double hanging valleys may be illustrated by the
case of Eussell Valley (Fig. 10) which enters the lower end of Disen-
chantment Bay, a part of the Yakutat Bay inlet. This valley has a
moderate slope and a remarkably well-developed U-shape (Fig. 11).
Where it joins the fiord it has- built a gravel delta, so that there the
actual rock bottom is not visible; but about a mile back from the
fiord, bed rock occurs in the valley bottom near its center. Extending

112

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GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA 113

the grade of this valley out into the main trough of Disenchantment
Bay, where the nearest soundings show a depth of from 600 to 1,000
feet, the profile falls far short of reaching the bed of the bay. It is
assumed, therefore, to be a hanging valley with the lip at or just
below the surface of the fiord water. If we grant that this particular
hanging valley may be due to faulting, which can not be disproved,
we are still left with the necessity of assuming block faulting along
the axis of the Eussell Valley to account for the hanging condition of
its own tributaries whose lips lie fully a thousand feet above the Eussell
Valley bottom (Fig. 12). In some cases even a third series of laterals
have been seen hanging above a tributary, which itself hangs above
another, which is hanging above a main trough.

To propose faulting as an explanation for such a complex system
of hanging valleys does not seem rational without definite evidence
of the faulting, and without some explanation of why the results of
such recent faulting are so common in glaciated regions and so rare in
unglaciated areas. Moreover, in some of the cases mentioned, for ex-
ample, the Eussell Valley itself, if there had been such faulting, it
would be easily detected in the sedimentary rocks which form the walls
of the valley. Since a search for evidence of recent faulting in this
valley failed to find it, I feel warranted in asserting that there has been
no such faulting as the theory demands. A glance at the photographs
(Figs. 10 and 11) is sufficient to show that the form of this valley
could not be accounted for on the basis of block faulting. Its flaring,
curving, U-shaped sides are not the forms characteristic of cliffs due
to faulting. Should it be stated that block faulting occurred at a
date sufficiently remote to permit the weathering back of the valley
walls to the present curve, it is sufficient to answer that in all the
time required for this, the lateral streams must of necessity have
trenched the bottoms of the hanging valleys and reduced them to an
accordant grade with the Eussell Valley stream. As Fig. 12 clearly
shows, this is far from being the case.

From the above statement of hypotheses it will be seen that it
is generally admitted that hanging valleys are a peculiar phenomenon
calling for special explanation. It is also true that this phenomenon
is practically confined to regions of former glaciation. Together with
the U-shaped valle}r, truncated spurs, and steepened main valley slopes,
the condition of hanging valleys is reported not only from a wide area
in Alaska and British Columbia, but in such other regions of former
glaciation as the Sierra Nevada, the Eocky Mountains, the Finger
Lake Valleys of central New York, the coast of Norway, the Alps,
the Himalayas and New Zealand. While exceptional instances of
hanging valleys, which are readily explained in other ways, have been
reported from unglaciated regions, these are so few and scattered, and
VOL. lxx. — 8.

ii4

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 12. Hanging Valley Tributary to Russell Valley (Fig. 11). The first tributary
from the mouth on the north side. The lip of this valley lies about 1,000 feet above the main
valley floor, and the stream flows over it on the very surface of the rock, forming a gorge,
below which it crosses moraine. A small glacier lies at the head of this hanging valley. Pho-
tograph by Lawrence Martin.

so unlike their abundant and striking development in glaciated regions,
that they are hardly to be considered as bearing upon the problem.

The facts discovered in reading the literature and in field investi-
gation, point to glacial erosion as the cause of the hanging valleys and
associated phenomena, while no facts are found that are vitally opposed
to it. Of no other hypothesis proposed may the same be said; on
the contrary, all other explanations are open to fatal objections.. The
great majority of students of glacial action are now in accord with the
belief in profound glacial erosion in favorable situations. Even those
opposed to the explanation by glacial erosion admit that the forms
under discussion are what would be expected if it were possible for
glaciers to perform such great erosive work.

The few who are opposed to this explanation have been able to
offer no better argument against it than their failure to believe in
the ability of ice to do erosive work in great amount. Some of this
opposition is based upon observations at the margins of small glaciers.
But all such observations have little value; for, as has been well stated
by another, if an observer could have been where ice was really capable
of profoundly eroding, he would not have been able to come back and
talk about it. The weak, retreating margin of a small valley glacier
gives no better basis for understanding profound glacial erosion than
a small meadow brook gives for a conception of the mode of formation

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA

of a Colorado Canyon. The objections to ice as an agent of profound
erosion remind one very much of the objections which, in the early
days, were urged against water as an agent of erosion. In this con-
nection reference may be made to a short note, signed H. G., on page
249 of the National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 16, 1905. This little
squib, which we may fairly safely ascribe to Henry Gannett, although
written in a humorous and somewhat sarcastic vein, is really a note-
worthy contribution to the discussion on glacial erosion. In it, as a
sort of reply to a recent arraignment of glacial erosion, he applies to
the now accepted belief in river erosion some of the same class of
arguments as those which have been urged against glacial erosion, and
with telling effect.

Since the establishment of the theory of profound glacial erosion
is the work of the last fifteen years, and since the full force of the
evidence has only recently been accepted by some of our leading physi-
ographers, it is natural that as yet there should not be universal accept-
ance of so new an idea, carrying with it such tremendous consequences.
But the fact that some workers have not yet accepted the doctrine does
not necessarily constitute a strong argument against it, and certainly
not enough to counterbalance the overwhelming evidence in its favor.
When a large number of people are involved, ultraconservatism is
always to be expected among some of them. There are, for example,
even at the present day, some highly intelligent men who are writing

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Fig. 13. The North Wall of Hidden Glacier Valley, a Tributary to the Yakutat
Bay Inlet, the Glacier Terminus Showing in the Midground. Note the smoothed,
striated lower walls due to glacial erosion as contrasted with the irregular topography of the
higher slopes due to ordinary weathering and stream erosion. A hanging valley enter- at
about the level between these two classes of slopes about a third of the way from the right
margin above the glacier. Photograph by R. S. Tarr.

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

polemics in opposition to the belief in former continental glaciation,
which almost every one now considers definitely established, though
after a hard fight.

It does not seem necessary at the present time to undertake to
show hoiu the glaciers did this, nor to prove that they could do it
when the evidence is so clear that they actually did do it. Suffice it
to say, that if glaciers smooth, scratch and pluck the rocks over which
they pass, as every one knows they do (Fig. 13), it requires only a
sufficiently long continuation of this action to lower valleys to any
extent up to the time when they cease to further smooth, scratch and
pluck. A century ago it seemed to many observers that at the slow
observed rate of recession of Niagara Falls it was impossible to explain

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Fig. 14 Looking Up (East) Nunatak Fiord. The rock knoll, or Nunatak, in the middle
of the picture, 1,400 feet high, splits the Nunatak glacier one arm, on the left, depcending to
the sea through the broader valley, the other occupying a smaller U-shaped valley on the right
side of the Nunatak. but not upon reaching the sea. When first seen by Prof. Russell in 1S91
these two arms nearly enclosed the Nunatak. The site of the hanging (Fig. 7) valley is on the
right side of the picture. Photograph by Lawrence Martin.

the seven miles of gorge as a result of this process. No one now doubts
this explanation of the Niagara gorge; and it is not doubted that the
Colorado Canyon has been formed by slow sawing into the strata, like
that which the river is now engaged in, but continued through a long
period of time. An application of the same principle — a slow rate
of erosion working for a long period of time — is all that is necessary to
understand profound glacial erosion, once it is granted that glaciers

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA 117

do scour their beds at all, as every one admits, and that there is plenty
of time available, as is well known to be the case.

Accepting ice erosion as a doctrine now established, as it seems
to me we must, we will briefly examine some of the consequences
of such erosion. Hanging valleys, U-shaped valleys, aligned spurs,
and steepened valley slopes are among the more prominent of these con-
sequences. From their existence we must of necessity infer enormous
vertical as well as lateral erosion, such erosion occurring in places
where actively moving streams of ice were concentrated in valleys along
relatively narrow lines. Along the Inside Passage, and in Yakutat
Bay, the two sections immediately under consideration in this paper,
the amount of erosion which must be deduced from the evidence is in
places not less than two thousand feet vertically; and erosion of this
magnitude has occurred along hundreds of miles of fiords.

In discussions of the significance of hanging valleys, it has been
rather common to speak as if the main valleys were eroded while
the tributaries were left undeepened. This has been done here, as
doubtless in other writings, in order not to introduce an unnecessary
complexity into the discussion. It would, however, be entirely errone-
ous to suppose that the lateral valleys were not eroded also. It re-
quires only an examination of the photographs accompanying this
paper to see that the normal cross-section of the hanging tributary
valleys has the same curve as that of the main valleys; that is, the
curve which glacial erosion produces.

From the statement just made, it follows that the level at which
a lateral valley now hangs above the main trough is not to be taken
as the full measure of vertical erosion along the main valley. That
this is true is indicated by the fact that of several valleys tributary to
a main trough, no two usually hang at exactly the same level. There
may be, and in many cases are, wide differences in the hanging levels
of neighboring valleys (Fig. 10) ; some being perched far up on the
mountain side, others so far lowered that the sea water enters and
drowns their mouths (compare Figs. 2 and 5), which, however, are
still hanging above the bottom of the fiord. Such differences in the
hanging level are, in the main, a measure of the difference in amount
of erosive work performed by glaciers in the several hanging laterals.

In general, those valleys occupied by the largest glaciers have been
lowered most ; and it may be stated as a law that, other conditions being
equal, the height of a hanging valley above the bottom of the main
trough varies inversely with the size of the glacier. The ojDeration of
this law is, of course, modified by the influence of varying rock texture,
slope and other causes which tend to modify the rate of ice erosion.
We are not yet in full enough possession of the facts relating to the
process of glacial erosion to warrant an attempt at a full statement
of the nature and result of the various influences which tend to modify

n8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the rate of erosion. There can be no question, however, that the nature
of the valley rock is of profound importance, some weak rocks being
eroded with relative rapidity by small glaciers, other rocks resisting
the erosion of even large, powerful glaciers. Two causes, the size
of the glacier and the nature of the enclosing rock, are, in all proba-
bility, of most importance in the modification of the height of valleys
left hanging by more rapid erosion along the main trough.

An argument which has been advanced against the power of
glaciers to erode, is the fact that rock islands sometimes rise from the
floor of valleys through which powerful glaciers have passed. It
has been claimed that such protuberances should have been erased
if the glaciers were really eroding greatly. When the operation
of glaciers as agents of erosion is truly understood, however, this
argument seems to favor rather than to oppose glacial erosion. It
is not to be supposed that glaciers would erode everywhere at the same
rate. There is naturally a variation in the rate of erosion of a valley
bottom dependent upon at least two important influences — nature of
rock and rapidity of ice currents — both of which are liable to vary in
any valley and thus necessarily give rise to irregularities in the ice-
eroded valley bottom. Once an obstacle arose in the path of a power-
fully moving glacier, it would have the tendency to split the ice current
around itself, much as a sand bar spilts the current of a river. By
interfering with the ice current in line with the obstacle, and by caus-
ing a concentration of movement on either side of it, the size of the
obstacle would naturally increase. Eock knolls, islands and nunataks
(Fig. 14) are such characteristic features in glacially eroded valleys
that, when the full significance of glacial erosion is understood, I be-
lieve they will be found to constitute one of- the distinctive evidences
of glacial erosion, to be -classed with hanging valleys, truncated spurs,
steepened slopes and U-shaped profiles.

In discussions on glacial erosion much attention has been paid to
rock basins, — basins with rock rims in the bottoms of glaciated velleys,
and oftentimes holding lakes. Such basins also occur on the fiord
floors of the Inside Passage. Irregularities in erosion, due to dif-
ferences in rock resistance and in ice currents, readily account for these.
As Andrews has shown in his remarkable papers on glacial erosion
in the ISTew Zealand fiords, one important cause for such basins, and
other forms of vigorous erosion, is the convergence of ice currents in
a valley of smaller cross section, causing acceleration of motion.
Rock basins must be added to the land forms resulting from and hence
indicative of profound glacial erosion.

Another feature at first apparently opposing glacial erosion is that
hanging valleys, truncated spurs, and steepened slopes are at times well
developed on one side of a main trough and either absent or poorly
developed on the other. This, however, seems a perfectly normal result

GLACIAL EROSION IN ALASKA 119

of ice erosion, for, as in a river, the current naturally at time impinges
upon one side with greater force than on the other, as, for example,
when by the entrance of a tributary the ice current is pushed against
the opposite side of the -valley.

A prominent feature in regions of former glaciation, both of con-
tinental glaciers and mountain-valley glaciers, is the presence of
through valleys, that is, valleys in which there is now no pronounced
divide. Such valleys abound in the Finger Lake region of central
New York, and they are common also in Alaska, and, as Penck has
shown, in the Alps. The evidence points to the conclusion that many
of these through valleys owe their characteristics to the passage of ice
across divides, and the consequent lowering of the divides by glacial
erosion. In some places in Alaska, as in the Yakutat Bay region, the
ice is still pouring across such divides; in other cases, owing to the
shrunken state of present-day glaciers, the through valleys are now oc-
cupied by glaciers which flow both ways from a low, flat divide area
across which, at a higher stage of the ice, through glaciers once passed.
So far as seen in the Yakutat Bay region, none of the through valleys
are entirely free from ice ; but in many cases the glaciers are so shrunken
as to expose the valley form, which is distinctly that characteristic of
glacial erosion. In central New York, where the work was performed
by continental glaciers instead of valley tongues, and where the ice
is entirely gone, the character of these through valleys is easily observed.
They are often U-shaped, steep-sided, straight-walled, and possess
hanging valleys.

The acceptance of the conclusion that glaciers have been powerful
agents of erosion, and doubtless still are where now in active operation,
seems a necessary result of a candid consideration of the evidence.
Once this conclusion is reached, a number of remarkable phenomena,
otherwise not satisfactorily explained, find ready explanation. The
belief in glacial erosion carries with it stupendous consequences, for it
assigns to glacial action some of the most striking topographical fea-
tures of regions formerly occupied by actively moving ice. Nowhere
is the evidence clearer, or the results more striking, than along the
Inside Passage to Alaska, and in the fiords northwest of this, such as
Yakutat Bay. For those who still doubt the effectiveness of ice erosion,
a trip through these fiords is strongly recommended instead of a study
of the weak termini of small, dwindling Alpine glaciers.

i2o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE RELATION OF SCHOOL ORGANIZATION TO

INSTRUCTION1

By Professor WILBUR S. JACKMAN

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

~N the text of an ancient story we are told that man was made out
-*- of the dust of the earth, and according to one version, at least, he
was then leaned up against the fence to dry. Afterwards the breath
of life was breathed into his nostrils and he became a living soul. This
venerable myth, accepted in its substance as truth by a part of the
human race for centuries, naturally lent its form to educational theory,
and thus profoundly influenced the methods employed in training
the young. From earliest times down to a generation ago education
was a breathing-in process that simply continued and expanded the
original act of creation. Then there arose a new conception concern-
ing the making of a man and educational theory is slowly changing its
form. Responding to influences from without, life is an unfolding
process from within — this is the conception that is now shaping our
methods of instruction.

The most interesting of all subjects of study is the evolution of
evolution. That the development and maintenance of the organism
depend upon its concessions to environment is a fact that has been
recognized, in a general way, from the dawn of the evolutionary idea.
The formal statement of the theory of evolution was long anticipated by
the practical sense of the world in its knowledge of the dependence of
the physical organism upon its material surroundings. But almost half
a century has past since that doctrine was stated and even now we
but dimly see its profound bearing upon the relation of the spiritual
life to spiritual conditions. And the extreme newness of a certain
phase of this higher aspect of evolution is evidenced by this meeting
itself, which is perhaps the first ever called for the distinct purpose
of considering the development of the social nature of the human being
under the stimulus of social conditions.

The particular agency in social development that it is proposed
to consider here is the school. It is not intended to deny that there are
other agencies that have a similar purpose; it is the intention, merely,
to maintain the thesis that within the range of its possibilities the
school should be organized so that it may operate as a social institu-

1 Paper read before The Social Education Congress, Boston, Mass., No-
vember 30, 1906.

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 121

tion; and it will be the aim, also, to point out some of the most im-
portant changes needed in present school organization that the desired
end may be attained.

The chief obstacle at present in the way of socializing the schools is
found in their forms of organization. The machinery of the average
school is an invention for the purpose of holding a pupil down while
we educate him by the breathing-in process. A social institution is an
organism; whereas, the school is formed essentially on a plan designed
for dealing with a sum of particulars. It is treated as a body having
merely the agglutinant characteristics of an aggregation. Few people
realize that the transformation of a school of the average type into a
social body means more than a change of name; in fact, however, it
really means a revolution.

Regardless of outward forms and of protestations to the contrary,
the real end of the school has been and still is the individual for him-
self and not the group. The school desk nailed to the floor circum-
scribes the space for the individual. The school grade represents an
endeavor to get pupils together who are so near alike that they may be
treated as an individual. The cry for extremely small classes, the
exclusiveness of the small private school, the emplo}rment of tutors,
all stand for efforts made toward the education of the individual for
himself practically in a state of isolation. The dead and persistent
drill upon the three R's backed up by the birch, by marks, by bribes,
by promises of promotion, by threats and by cajolery has but a feeble
socializing power. It is on the contrary essentially individualistic in
the unwholesome rivalry which it always promotes.

If any one doubts the barrenness of the social life in our schools
let him read as I have done in this the past few days the reminiscent
records of students now in the university in which they narrate their
experiences in the elementary schools. They tell of a dreary round of
lesson learning with a little variation here and there as to the stimuli
used, all of which were classed as either personal rewards or personal
punishments. It was all summed up admirably by one student who
said: "We always had text-books, and definite lessons were learned
each day and recited, as it seems now, to the teacher because we invari-
ably looked at the teacher while reciting and tried to see some mark of
approval on her face." In the entire series of papers there is not a
single instance noted when there was any attempt made to establish
relations of helpfulness among the pupils themselves. There is, how-
ever, considerable mention of various means employed, by the teacher
to keep the pupils in a state of isolation from each other. As a matter
of fact some of the most elaborate and artistically stupid parts of the
school machinery have been especially devised for the purpose of keeping
pupils from mutual assistance; whereas, the thing above all else de-

i22 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

mancled in society at large is that its members shall help each other to
the utmost. The only places where mutual helpfulness is not recog-
nized as being in every way worthy is in school and in prison; in this
particular the teacher behind the desk and the guard mounted on the
walls have something in common. It is most unfortunate that this
tendency toward mutual assistance is treated as though it were an
iniquity — as an especial brand of original sin; while, in fact, it is the
latest dawning and most lovable, civilizing trait in human character.

The proposition to transform the school into a well-organized social
institution is not merely a matter of abstract theory or pure science. It
is a definite expression of a movement to make the schools in common
with other agencies a positive force in bettering the conditions of life.

This proposition rests upon the foundation stone in human charac-
ter that up to date has been rejected by the educational builders —
namely, the natural tendency of children toward helpfulness. The
spirit of consideration and helpfulness is what we most need in human
life and the schools must cherish it in the children and train directly
for it. The kindergarten, here as ever, is the best type of what we want
in school life clear through the university. Go into any good kinder-
garten and note how gladly the children participate in the many op-
portunities for cooperation in living their simple and beautiful life.
Go then into the upper grades, and into the high school, and into the
university and observe how one by one those opportunities for partici-
pation in the upbuilding of the public weal have been withdrawn and
mark the degenerative effect of this loss of opportunity upon the social
qualities of the pupils !

There are in this country many universities that number from
1,000 to 5,000 students each year. These young people represent a
virile period of human life, when hope is young, aspirations are keen
and the will is dominant. But when taken in their totality, in their
power or in their desire to organize as an influence upon any phase
whatever of human affairs, they are as innocuous and as ineffective as
a flock of sheep on a sunny hillside in April. There is not a university
president, nor a professor, nor a university department of sociology, to
my knowledge, that has ever yet organized the splendid native force
of a great student body towards any public end that is worth the atten-
tion of an intelligent man. Nor does the student body itself show any
such disposition to organize. The highest watermark that has yet been
touched in fusing together the community forces in the great universi-
ties is represented by the college yell for the foot-ball team ! No other
state institution could so completely withdraw these thousands of young
people from a consideration of the interests of public welfare.

Even in darkest Eussia, with every influence against them, with
no public school system, where blackest ignorance is the rule with the

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 123

people, the student bodies in the universities represent perhaps the
most powerful hostile influences with which despotism must contend.

This shows the power of student life when it organizes itself under
the whip of a great, purpose, and it mercilessly exposes the enormous
moral loss to society and the delinquencies of an educational theory
which permits any diversion of these forces of youth from the work
of upbuilding the social and national life.

The economic vandalism of our time can be charged to no one per-
son or thing; but responsibility for it may be laid directly at the door
of a school system which permits this social deterioration to begin in
the earliest years and thence onward to increase in a steady ratio
throughout the higher institutions of learning.

All schools, however, have always had some social life of a more
or less organized character. In the plays and games outside of school
hours; in the stolen whispers of the study and recitation periods; in
the clandestine schemes laid for the discomfiture of the teacher; in
the literary societies, and in many other ways, through the exercise
of their social instincts, the pupils have managed to make their school
days tolerable for themselves and, to a like extent, often intolerable for
the teacher. But these aspects of school life have been, and still are,
considered as diversions, as incidents and somewhat as detriments to
what is called, in school parlance, the ' regular work.' It is largely due
to this fact that in most schools the socializing process as yet remains
inchoate.

There is a misconception, almost universal, concerning the organiz-
ing center of the school as a social body. Eecognizing that in the
past the chief organizing influence has come through the exercise of the
play instinct, the unguarded inference is that it is now proposed to
socialize the school through play alone; or, what comes to the same
thing, by the introduction of work which shall be turned into play !
It is through this perverted idea that the New Education stands charged
with triviality in its methods and with a disregard for that robust
discipline which comes through sturdy and purposeful work. Nothing
could be farther from the truth. Students in the philosophy of edu-
cation are slowly coming to understand that the spelling-book, as such;
that the endless repetitions which usually accompany ' formal number ' ;
that the struggle with words merely for the sake of a vocabulary in
reading; that the wrestle with technical grammar as an introduction
to the study of language — that all these and other subjects of like kind,
as they generally appear in the schools, are essentially unsocial in their
influence. Such students believe that herein lies a great obstacle to that
reform which seeks to socialize the schools. If, however, this so-called
work is to be removed from its present dominating position in the
curriculum, it is as yet inconceivable to most people how there can be

i24 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

anything to take its place except play. It is only too true that in many
schools where the old technical drills have been discarded, the teachers
have been unable to find anything worthy to take their place, and there
at once develops a tendency towards inferior social types of organiza-
tion. These lower social units taking root readily in a school where
many of the old arbitrary means of control have been abandoned, in-
evitably become immediately inimical to the broader interests of the
school as a whole. In this condition of affairs we find that raison d'etre
for the fraternities and sororities in the high schools.

The prime necessity in the social organization of the school is that
there shall be an abundance of those activities which are capable of
yielding tangible results in worthy products having a common interest.
The distinction usually drawn between the activity of play and the
activity of work has neither meaning nor value in terms of growth.
Both play and work may be good or bad, educative or otherwise; that
depends alone upon the motive. The infallible test is found in the
character of the output; it is a measure that anyone may apply with
ease and directness when education is conceived to be a concern of the
familiar things of life.

An educational activity with an organizing value is one which
expresses itself through some helpful work. This is not a machine-
made definition — it depends upon the nature of things. It is rooted
in the fact that every child is a born worker and a lover of work. To
work, to do things, to bring about results, useful and beautiful, is just
as natural as it is for him to breathe the air. There are no lazy
children, naturally. Catch them young and treat them right, and they
are all workers and lovers of work. A lazy boy is merely either one
who is sick, or one who does not like to do something which a ' grown-
up ' thinks he should do; his indisposition, if not a matter for the
physician, should be placed to his credit. A big boy came to my office
one day who was too lazy, the teacher said, to be allowed to remain
in school. I asked him what he would like to do if he were left entirely
free to choose, and he replied : ' I would quit school and go to work ! ' I
thanked him — inwardly — for his criticism, over which I have since
deeply pondered. Doubtless the 'work' which this boy would be able
to pick up in the streets would be as little to his taste as were the
tasks left behind in the school. For the average employer rarely con-
siders the soul-life of the employed. He stands a good chance of
falling into the hands of a man who wants to get more gold out of dry
goods and groceries than nature has put into them and he tries, there-
fore, to make up the deficit out of the boy. So between the teachers
who do not know enough and the business men who do not care enough
the lazy boys are easily turned into the path of the transgressor. Lazi-
ness is the merciful invention of nature, whereby she holds them

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 125

for a time at the parting of the ways, and enables them during this
period of wavering to escape the stupidity of the schools, on the one
hand, and the heart-breaking conditions of business on the other.

It was a bad day for education when it got itself placed over
against work; when it made work a penalty for the stupid and a
punishment for the perverse who would not allow education to be
breathed into them — and education is just finding out its colossal
blunder. Figures from the fourth grade up show that, when it is
solely a question of school or work, it is work that wins the contest,
hands down. Of the hosts that enter the primary grade, practically all
the children of all the people, by far too small a per cent, finish the
eighth year; of these a still lesser per cent, go to the high school, and
beyond this there is scarcely more than a negligible minority. This
absorption of child-life by the world's work all takes place in the face
of modern educational theory, our advanced views of culture, our legal
enactments, and the truant officer !

Any fair test applied to a school will show two things: first, that
the pupils are capable of far more productive work than is now called
for and, second, that they are anxious for more of it. This fall this
question was put to about two hundred. pupils from the sixth grade up:
If the building were open to you after school, would you like to stay
for extra work? What would you like to do and how much time
would you use? In the replies received all but twelve or fifteen said
they would like to stay from one half hour to two hours on from one
to four days a week. The range of choice was practically all among the
arts and crafts. Work in the wood shops was most popular, there
being about sixty applicants for this, while work in metal, in clay, in
textiles, bookbinding, printing, gymnastic dancing, photography and
many others had a strong following.

Yet education is not wholly a matter of tasks. This is the pitfall
that catches most of our critics who contrast the old with the new. If
education were the result of tasks arbitrarily imposed; and if the old
set tasks for the pupils that were difficult enough to hold them to the
top notch of effort; and if the new levied only those that were so easy
that the pupils became dawdlers, then the apostles of the present
regime in school would have it their own way. But here is the differ-
ence that is world wide. The new, while rejecting the idea of imposing
tasks arbitrarily, seeks to establish conditions which challenge the
personal initiative. The old over-emphasizes attainment as a quanti-
tative result : The new values attainment only as it represents a quality
of mind that has acted through its own initiative. The old recognized
as training and discipline the so-called voluntary attention which
seemed to be mainly the ability to stare, ox-like, a disagreeable, unin-
teresting or unintelligible thing out of countenance. The new believes

i26 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

in the training and discipline that come from the pupil's effort to
follow up from premise to conclusion, something which mightily in-
terests him because of its worthy purpose. The old found satisfaction
in a state of mind that was quietly receptive; the new sees hope in the
turbulence of inquiry; and all of these are irreconcilable differences
in kind.

When the work of the children springs from their own initiative,
it will become essentially creative and not imitative. The theory that
the educational process is imitative and not creative especially in the
earlier and formative years of childhood is as old as psychology itself
and in practise the proposition stands almost unchallenged. The
average curriculum is formed on the idea that the pupils are imitators,
the followers of directions, and not creators and it is consequently
imposed. The daily lessons in scope and character, the methods of the
recitations, the modes of expression are all prescribed and all the
activities of the school are reduced as nearly as possible to that monot-
onous routine known to the devotee of system as ' regular work ' which
offers no play for the creative intelligence in either thought or deed.

The constructive idea now being realized in various forms of hand-
work is the thin end of the wedge that is opening the way to reform.
Anything which involves the hand immediately arouses the creative
instincts. Much of this work is still of the illustrative type, merely
reproductive or imitative and in the beginning it was all of that char-
acter. In wood, for example, the ' exercises ' were all once manacled
to a set of models that made no claim upon creative powers either
through their use or beauty.

At present, nearly all subjects in the curriculum make some appli-
cation of the constructive idea. The lessons of history are vivified by
reproducing typical creations of other days. Science becomes somewhat
more real by the performance of experiments set by book and teacher.
Mathematics has been improved through its applications to prescribed
construction. Something of both the technique and the spirit of art
is acquired by reproducing the work of the masters. This all repre-
sents a distinct improvement upon the old regime of books and lectures,
and such exercises will always form an organic and necessary part of
an educational system.

But the high-water mark in school-teaching will be reached only
when such work becomes secondary because it is supplementary and
subsidiary. Only when the dominant note of the school is clearly cre-
ative does it lay direct hold upon the vital and continuous interests of
the children and become essentially educative.

This is true regardless of subject-matter or material on the one
hand, and age or sex on the other, and to this fact some curious school-
room phenomena are due. Parents frequently marvel that the boys of

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 127

1 all ages delight in cooking and textiles, while the girls are equally
interested in woodwork and other forms of heavier manual training.
The reason, however, is clear. It is not that there is anything inherent
in either the dough, or the cloth, or the wood, or the iron, but rather
because the work under all these heads is largely creative. It is because
an aim is set up that is unique; it is somewhat new because it is per-
sonal— it is because the ages-old materials must be combined to fit new
occasions that the interest is enlisted and the best original efforts, and
consequently the highest educational results, are obtained.

Every creative activity will have its artistic aspect; for when the
soul enters a creation, then and there art is born. Art-forms are now
rarely creative. They do little more than tickle the sense with the
pleasures of a fleeting hour — and they are worth all they cost for that !
But when the lives of the children are properly enriched, music, paint-
ing, drawing, sculpture, and the rest will come forth as creations — the
radiant allies of speech. In language growing fluent and supple, the
pupils will learn to wreathe in descriptive, dramatic and poetic forms
the subtlest creations of which the human mind is capable.

Creative work transforms the individual. Through it, alone, he
grows and maintains a personality that makes him different from
others. Through it, alone, his generation rises above all that have pre-
ceded. Imitation is a training in conformity. It holds the creative
instincts in abeyance until at maturity it is the exceptional man or
woman who is not hopelessly bound by the shackles of convention. If
he would ever create, he must override the prejudices ground into
him by the schools, and, even then, the daring freedom of childhood
but rarely comes again. The gospel of conformity teaches that the
best has been done — that naught remains for us but imitation. This,
too, in face of the practical fact that the discoveries of to-day have sent
to the scrap-heap the brilliant inventions of yesterday! The effect
is not less marked in the realm of morals. Generally speaking, the
ethical code of the school has been copied from that which once served
the purpose of the generation that developed it, but it is far below what,
under present conditions, the pupils can create for themselves.

The final test as to the value of any piece of educational work in
the development of children of whatever intellectual capacity is de-
termined by their appreciation of its worth in meeting a natural de-
mand. Unless their energies are constantly directed toward filling a
recognized want, the pupils put forth their efforts in vain, and the
routine of the school becomes merely the rattle and grind of empty
machinery. Upon one trait in his pupils the teacher may forever
reckon : they will always respond to a need which they can really feel
and understand. A study of our city parks showed how impossible it
was for certain useful and beautiful birds to find suitable nesting-

128 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

places in the trees and shrubs. Forthwith practically every pupil in
the school volunteered to make boxes for the nests. Whether the
smaller children could make an entire box or not mattered but little;
the strength of their want through a real sense of the need, coupled
with the little they could do, added cubits to their moral stature.

A practical difficulty in the way of teaching children to realize
their motives in some useful end, is that to many people it looks too
much like common work; there are parents, therefore, who strenu-
ously object. They say their children can get that at home, and that
the school should stand for something else — for culture ! This is a
curious fact, in view of the glorification that labor is now receiving at
the hands of the people. However, the large storekeepers do say that
this great revival of enthusiasm for labor has not as yet appreciably
increased the demand for overalls and jumpers. No one has reported,
so far, that the cuts of these elegant and useful trappings of toil are
appearing in the latest fashion plates of our high-class tailors. From
this it may be inferred that with most people the labor question has
not yet gone beyond the stage of academic discussion. Hence the
difficulty of getting the pupils actually to work either in school or at
home. Last year the children wished to have blooming plants in their
school-room windows. They thought to improve matters by substituting
for the unsightly pots the more beautiful creations of their own hands
which they could easily make in the clay-room. Immediately a parent
wrote that if our pupils could find nothing better to do than to make
jardinieres to beautify the University of Chicago he would take his
son from the school — and he did ! The kind of school which this type
of parent really wants is one where his boy can insensibly acquire
curvature of the spine, a sallow complexion, spectacles, and — culture !
We have trade and technical schools that give education for the sake of
labor; we must now have schools that give us labor for the sake of
education.

To sum up, therefore, the resources of the school which the teacher
may utilize in the development of a social organism we have on the
part of the pupils (1) a natural spirit of helpfulness; (2) an inborn
love of work; (3) a desire to take the initiative; (4) an ambition for
creative work; and (5) an alertness of mind toward public" needs.
Upon these foundation stones the social structure must be reared.

That these qualities of character may be normally developed, the
curriculum must provide an abundance of suitable material; the class
exercises must keep to the forefront matters of public interest and the
entire organization must offer a maximum of freedom to the individual
who thinks and works in the interest of the common welfare. Every-
one recognizes these elements of character as being those which give us
the highest type of citizenship in the community at large. It is inter-

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 129

esting and pertinent to inquire why they do not give corresponding
results in the school. People generally seem to understand that the
school should reflect the interests of the community, but the traditions
of the school are such that the instant an industry or an art is intro-
duced into the schoolroom the tendency is to erect it at once into a
' subject of study.' This means to the average person that it must have
its special teacher, its arbitrary place on the program, and in other
ways take a definite setting in the curriculum. Now, there is a vast
and an essential difference between this kind of so-called organization
attempted by the school, and the actual organization which takes place
in true community life. If, for example, under normal conditions, in
the latter, a wagon is to be made, the various activities that contribute
to that particular end are so correlated as to combine efficiency and
economy. Everybody's efforts are directed to that result. There is
just so much wood needed and no more. A premium is placed upon the
endeavor to use as little as may be consistent with the character of the
wagon desired. The same is true of the iron work — no more bolts or
bands are made than are actually needed. So, also, it is with the paint ;
what the wood needs for its preservation and adornment is used, and
nothing beyond. But bring these industries into school as 'hand-
work/ and we find only so many more ' subjects of study ' that in some
way must be juggled into an already overcrowded program; only so
many more teachers that are to increase the wear and tear in already
overwrought children. It is no longer a question of doing just as little
as is needed, but as much as possible ! It is as though the wagon-maker
were to go ahead blindly and make a dozen wheels where only four
can possibly be used ; as though the blacksmith should forge a hundred
pieces of iron where but twenty are needed ; and as if the painter should
demand forty hours for his work when five would be altogether ade-
quate. We are in an incipient stage of development, where there is
insufficient attention given to the relation between demand and supply.
The work generally in any particular subject represents the strength
and the personal push of the teachers, or the reverse. If by superior
wit, or by greater cunning, or by sharpness of tooth or strength of
claw the ambitious teacher is able to get a lion's share of the program,
his particular subject may be correspondingly magnified, even to the
detriment of all others.

If the school is to approximate still further the ideals of community
life it is necessary that there should be a more flexible adjustment of
the workers to each other and to the thing to be done. The grouping
and distribution of the pupils should be based upon the nature of their
work. The school grade as now generally constituted is a pure fiction
in philosophy but it is a stubborn and unreasonable fact in practise.
Under the domination of the grading system, the school reverses or

VOL. lxx. — 9.

130 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ignores most of the principles that control people in practical affairs.
Under its operation, it compels the teacher to lay the greater emphasis
upon the similarities among pupils, and to ignore differences, and it
places a premium upon uniformity. The more closely the school grade
approaches its ideal, the more strictly must each pupil work for him-
self; while the closer we approximate the grouping required by the
social ideal, the more earnestly must the individual strive for the whole.

The school grade aims at a certain dead level of uniformity in
three things, namely, age, knowledge and skill. These rigid conditions
have imposed the stamp of their own arbitrariness upon the selection
of subject-matter and methods of instruction, and they render it im-
possible to realize the highest ideals of social and civic life in the
school. The grading system was established long before child-study
opened the eyes of teachers, and it represents the quantity idea in edu-
cation as opposed to that of quality.

In school, not all of the teaching is done by the teacher ; the younger
children are constantly learning from the older. Experience shows
that when pupils have the opportunity to organize themselves for work
they form groups which in many instances utterly ignore the age limits
set by the grade. The younger pupils gain in skill and knowledge, and
the older have lessons in consideration for others and in responsibility
that in a graded system must remain forever untaught.

It is equally undesirable to grade pupils on the basis of equality of
knowledge. Outside of school such an aggregation of people would be
considered a stupid company, with but little chance for improvement.
It would distinctly improve the situation to bring together in some
common enterprise pupils who differ widely in both knowledge and
experience. This applies especially where the pupils are employed in
doing rather than in talking. The less capable learn from those who
know more, and the latter will learn to work from the strongest stimu-
lus that can move anyone — the necessity of making knowledge immedi-
ately intelligible and available for others. The nearer the conventional
grade is approximated, the less there is of such a motive; for a simi-
larity of knowledge makes each one useless and uninteresting to every
other.

The same argument applies against the requirements for a parity
of skill. Every pupil has a certain skill of his own, and his work
should so relate him to others that he may make the most of it. He
need not be ' graded ' with those having equal skill in the same direc-
tion. This point finds illustration in the building of a house. In this
there may be six or eight different kinds of workmen employed. No
two have quite the same skill, in no two is it required. Each one does
what is needed and what he is best able to do. The group is so
organized that the house-building progresses rapidly and well; but the

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 131

organization bears no resemblance to that arbitrary aggregation known
as a ' grade.'

The effect of the present grading system upon the treatment of
subject-matter has been pernicious. It has led to endless attempts at
cross-sectioning subjects, in order that certain portions may be trimmed
down to fit the pigeon-holes of the grades. This is reflected in thou-
sands of text-books, and there is scarcely a subject that has not been
marred by the ill-advised analysis.

The evils of arbitrary grading are not less marked in their effects
upon the teacher. The notion that each grade must have its method
is most persistent at the two extremes — the kindergarten and the high
school. Those entering a course of training for the kindergarten are
loath to trouble themselves with what lies beyond; and the would-be
high-school teacher is apt to regard a suggestion that he look into the
nature of elementary instruction as a reflection upon his intelligence.

The influence of the grading system upon the pupil is necessarily
bad. It retards his progress through the elementary school, and it
fosters selfishness. In the wake of the grade, trail many evils that fret
the children. Not the least of these are the marking system and formal
examinations, which have done more to introduce and foster knavery
during the impressionable years of childhood than all other agencies
combined. Under such unphilosophic and arbitrary stimuli to action,
it matters not how hard he may try, no pupil can grow up wholly honest
or unselfish.

Grouping of pupils under the ideals of the new education rests
upon a principle radically different from that which now prevails.
Under the old ideals, the children must exert themselves to excel each
other. Under the new, members of a group must exert themselves to
help each other. In the former, the work is so planned that each must
strive for the same thing — the very same bone ; in the latter that — as in
the building of the house — the best effort of each is a needed con-
tribution to the welfare of all. Each, therefore, must encourage and
support the other. It is the operation of this principle that at once
divides the light from darkness, that lifts civilization out of barbarism,
that filters righteousness from iniquity, and that will finally give us
the ideal school. The problem of grading and grouping of pupils
will be solved when the children are permitted to plan work for them-
selves that demands cooperation. It must be for an end that no one by
himself can attain, that, in school as well as out, the principle may be
established that no one can live unto himself alone. That is the su-
preme fact in democracy.

The reorganization of the schools on the basis of community life
makes an imperative demand for a new type of trained teachers.
Academic training has been amply provided for and it hereafter will

132 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

be assumed. The past generation has done practically all that need be
done to place within easy reach of every intelligent teacher whatever
it is necessary to know concerning special methods. Within the same
period the subjects of psychology and child-study have been thoroughly
worked over, and the results have been fully and clearly presented.
This part of the teacher's training, hereafter, will not become of lesser
importance, but it will be more and more assumed as a preliminary to
the newer training which the public is now demanding. The greatest
need of the schools is teachers who have the power to reach the public
mind. The power to teach the children will be taken for granted.

The new type of training will not be found in a further elabora-
tion and intensification of book study and theoretical discussion; nor
will it appear in a further development of specialization as that is
now commonly understood. It will be based upon actual 'field work'
carried on in the community at large. That is, the teachers in training
must study the needs of a community as they manifest themselves in
its daily life; they must, in fact, in some way become actual partici-
pants in that life. No other kind of training will ever equip prospective
teachers to answer questions which the public is now asking. The
school must go into the service of the community more directly, and
the community must open itself up more freely to whatever service the
school can render.

Up to the present time the training schools for teachers are all
modeled upon the plan and after the ideals of the older educational
institutions of an academic type, and these, in their turn, grew out
of the cloister. The training schools for teachers, on the contrary,
should be modeled rather upon the plan of the so-called social settle-
ment, and the ideals of the teacher must become more nearly allied to
those of the settlement worker. Every school should be so organized
as to draw all the people together for the purposes of work, of study,
and of recreation, as the public library now attracts people who wish
to read. To this end, the studios, the workrooms, the laboratories, and
the libraries of the schools should be open under the supervision of the
teachers, as public libraries are under the librarians, to suit the con-
venience of the people. They should be open at least as many hours as
the saloons. A training school for teachers that could place its pros-
pective graduates for at least a year in such intimate relations with
community life as the settlements afford would give them the best
possible preparation for undertaking with the people the joint task
of educating the children. This does not mean, of course, that such
training can be acquired only in the reeking and congested districts
of the cities. Every locality in city, village, and country, should offer
some opportunity for the practical training of teachers in the science
and art of working with people. The teacher should take a leader's

SCHOOL ORGANIZATION AND INSTRUCTION 133

part in the debate of every question that relates to human welfare.
It is only by the most active participation in public affairs that he can
keep himself in proper training for the task of teaching the people's
children.

The coming era of education will be marked, not by its material
resources, but by its teachers. Our school houses are good enough;
now let there be trained teachers, then we shall have schools. Such
teachers will be equipped, of course, with knowledge; but above all
they will be trained in discernment — in the power to see and appre-
ciate the fundamental things of human growth and in its output of
character. They too must work with the children, not alone for them,
and be creative; to create they too must be free. The present system
that grinds and chafes at every move was developed under archaic
ideals; it has become antiquated and in large measure useless. The
organization of the schools must grow out of the professional necessities
of the teachers, the greatest of which is that even the poorest shall be
free to put the best of himself into his work. Under such conditions
every teacher and every child will become a positive creative moral
force in the upbuilding of the social structure.

i34 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

m SEAECH OF TRUTH1

By Professor DAVID STARR JORDAN

STANFORD UNIVERSITY

A T the January meeting of the Astral Club at Alcalde, Mr. Arthur
-*--*- Grimshaw, of Berkeley, the newly appointed science teacher of
the Alcalde Union High School read a curious and interesting though
revolutionary paper on the ' source of knowledge.' His title was
' What is Truth ?' This paper was highly appreciated by the club as
the example of the best results which can be attained on the material
plane of thought. The author's failure to rise to the heights of astral
conception was however painfully evident. It is plain that in the
laboratories where his training was secured all esoteric sources of truth
have been ignored. But as the Astral Club of Alcalde, though I say
it who should not, is nothing if not open-minded, it shall be the duty
of the secretary to transfer to this record the substance of this young
man's views on the tests by which truth may be known.

Mr. Grimshaw began by a discussion of the significance of ' philo-
sophic doubt' whereby men question the only things they know to be
true, in the hope of proving the reality of things they know are not
true. For if you can show that truth and falsehood are identical in
the one case, it lends probability to the theory that falsehood is truth
in other cases. On this general argument are founded many forms
of modern philosophy and of ancient philosophy as well. Mr. Grim-
shaw said :

" What I mean to show is that all truth is truth so far as it goes. The
things we know to be real are real and we are not deceived in believing
in them. The proof of the reality of an object, the truth of a proposi-
tion lies in the fact that we can accept it and translate it into action,
into life. If it were not true we could not act upon it. Acts based
upon it would sooner or later put an end to existence.

" The real nature of an object before us may make little importance
to us. It may be solid rock or empty vapor, if we choose to let it alone.
But the moment we form relations with it its reality becomes a vital
matter. If it is a rock or an apple, then rock or apple it is in all its
relations. If we view the apple as something essentially different from
what it is, there will be similar errors in our thought of other things.
If we are deceived as to the rock we shall have unsound notions as to
other things.

1 Being further extracts from the Journal of the Astral Club of Alcalde.

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 135

" Poisons would seem as foods, foods as poisons ; pleasures as sins, and
sins as pleasures. The whole sanity and accuracy of life would be de-
stroyed. For the security of action is conditioned by the exactness of
our perceptions of the relations of external things and by the correct-
ness of our reasoning in regard to these perceptions."

Mr. Grimshaw, falling back on the lore he had learned in school,
said:

" In psychology the term reality is sometimes applied to a sense per-
ception which is based on an outside influence acting then and there.
In this sense the reality is not the external influence itself, but our
direct or normal perception of it. Thus, the impression made by the
sound of a gun would be a reality when the pressure' of air waves reached
the brain, though the explosion may have taken place some seconds
before. This reality as it comes to the brain should bear a definite rela-
tion to its source. In other words it must give the mind such informa-
tion that the actual occurrence may be correctly interpreted. On its
correct interpretation the fitness of our response in action must be
conditioned. The term e common sense ' is applied to the normal work-
ing of these brain processes. An external stimulus produces a reality.
The reality is transmitted to the brain where it is considered in its
proper relations. Afterwards an impulse to action passes along the
motor nerves to the muscles, which are the servants of the brain.

" In simple matters, as those pertaining to the apple, the dictates of
common sense are obvious enough. The feelings are not moved by an
apple, and our recognition of its nature is clouded by no illusions. But
there are many relations in life in which ' common sense' does not find
the problem so easy. If we examine the actions of ourselves and of our
fellows, we shall find that the ' common sense ' of different men does
not act in parallel ways, and what seems to one wise or natural becomes
grotesque or absurd to another."

Mr. Grimshaw then gave a number of illustrations of thought or
action in which the 'common sense' may be deceived:

" You are in a railway train which is waiting on a side-track.
Another train comes in sight, its motion seems transferred to your own
train, but in the opposite direction. This motion continues until the
other train has passed. It ceases suddenly, when you can almost feel
the jolt of its stopping. But from other observations you know that
your train has not moved in all this time.

" This is a simple illusion, easily corrected by the mind before it
passes over into action. Let us look at some others. The story is told
of a merchant who, smacking his lips over a glass of brandy, said to
his clerk : ' The world looks very different to the man who has taken a
good drink of brandy in the morning.' ' Yes,' said the clerk, ' and he
looks different to the world, too.' Now, which is right? Is the world

1 36 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

different that it looks brighter ? So it seems to the man's own ' com-
mon sense.' Or is the difference subjective only, in the man himself,
who has lost his bearings to the outside world ?

" The revered sage of Los Gatos, Brother Ambrose Bierce, tells the
story of a man who visited a naturalist in San Francisco, and remained
over night as a guest. The naturalist was fond of snakes and had
several of them in the house. When the visitor retired at night he
looked under the bed and found a great coiled serpent, who watched
him with glittering eyes. These eyes made some strange impression on
him, and in the morning the people of the house found their guest
kneeling on the floor, dead, his open eyes still staring in horror at the
thing under the bed. This thing was the stuffed skin of a kingsnake
with two shoe-buttons for eyes. The ' common sense ' of the man told
him that the snake was charming him, and in the belief that he was
charmed to a horrible death he must have perished. If he had not
believed that snakes have the power to ' charm ' and to kill, surely he
would not have died.

" It is said that a ship once landed on a barren island in the Pacific
Ocean. Its passengers brought with them the materials for a house,
which they set up, to the surprise of the natives who had never seen
a wooden house before. They put in it blankets and cooking utensils,
and after a day or two they set up near the house on a solid foundation
a long tube through which they gazed by turns at the sun. After
watching the sun for a single day, they hastily returned to the ship,
carrying the long tube and the blankets, but leaving the house and
everything else of value on the island. The delighted natives took
possession of the house and they hold it to this day. But they look in
vain for the return of the foolish people who left it there.

" Men who have traveled in Mexico tell me that all along the coasts
of Sinaloa, people are engaged in digging for buried treasures under
the direction of men or women in San Francisco. These people have
never been in Mexico, but they are said to have the power of seeing
clearly objects not before them, in any part of the earth. There is
a very old legend current which tells that a pirate ship, hard pressed
by the Mexican soldiers, landed on the Cape of Camarron near Nazatlan,
where the buccaneers hastily buried a vast treasure of silver, after which
they all fled. A man is engaged to-day in boring a tunnel into solid
granite and lava to find the treasures thus laid away. A woman, in a
shabby Sacramento Street boarding house, claims to see in her trances
the inner secrets of the mountains and directs all these operations. Our
common sense or our experience may condemn the whole operation as
ridiculous but the transit of Venus seemed equally absurd to the local
critics who occupy its abandoned shelter.

" One man takes a forked rod of witch-hazel, and, going over a tract

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 137

of land he feels the fork twist downward at a certain point. He digs
there and finds a well of living water. If there is much water the
rod turns more vigorously or even turns the other way. Another uses
the same rod and finds coal, iron, gas or building stone — whatever he
may seek. To do this he has only to attach to the branch of the rod a
small fragment of that which he would seek. Thus a dime may
be attached if one is seeking for silver, a five-dollar gold piece if one
looks for gold. In California where there is no witch-hazel the moun-
tain willow serves the purpose best, because there is water in its make
up. But even the madrono or the azalea can be used in an emergency.
A man once tried to bore for gas on a certain tract of land in southern
Indiana. He engaged a soothsayer with a witch-hazel rod. But the
wizard, finding the territory too large to be gone over in this way,
makes a little rod, parlor size, and taking the map of Vanderburg
county, goes over it with the instrument. The result was just as satis-
factory. He chooses a point on the map, they bore the well in accord-
ance with the rod's directions. Plenty of gas is found, which proves
the accuracy of the method. As Lord Bacon once observed ' men mark
when they hit, but never when they miss.' Still another man wishes to
find the material of which a star is made. He takes a tube of metal
with lenses and prisms of glass and turns it toward the star. Speedily,
by means of lines and streaks on the prism he has his answer, and the
composition of a vast sun, so far away that the light which left it in
the days of Cassar has never yet reached us, he describes with confidence.
Then he turns his tube on the Pole Star and tells us that it is made
of two stars, one a great sun which we can see, and the other a smaller
sun which we have never seen and which we can never see. Is all this
real? If the spectroscope tells the truth where it speaks in such bold
fashion, may we not trust the witch-hazel, too, in its more modest
claims ?

" An astronomer traces the course of a far-off planet and finds that
its orbit bends a little from a perfect ellipse. From this fact he con-
cludes that another planet must be coming near it to attract it. He
goes to work to determine the size of this other planet and the place
in which it ought to be. When his calculation is finished the telescope
is turned toward this place, and the unseen planet is there. If the
mathematician through his instruments be thus sensitive to far-off
matter in infinite space, may not the clairvoyant through her sensitile-
projectile astral body be equally sensitive to a mass of silver?

" Once in a trance a finely organized adept or ' medium ' wandered
in her astral body through the open belt where the souls of the planets
wander at will. While there she heard the comet-shriek, the cry of a
lost planet soul, the most terrible sound that rings through the heavenly
spaces of the zenith. Is not her testimony to be received with that of
the other astronomers?

138 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

" From shore to shore across the Atlantic Ocean runs a metallic
cable. By means of electric batteries, magnets and sparks, a message
is conveyed from one end of this to the other. Messages have been
sent so many times that the most sceptical can not doubt the fact. By
such means a wanderer in any part of the world may be found and
called home, or if need be, sent still further on. Most of us have seen
this done and all have heard of it. Because it has grown familiar it
seems real to us, and its mystery is dissipated. But why use the
metallic cable at all ? What occult power lurks in metal ? Why must
we work always on the material plane? Why not use the air? And
indeed the air has been used and with wonderful success. But let us
not stop here. Why not use the invisible ether, along which so many
forms of energy are propagated ? Why not use the boundless sympathy
of life ? In Europe there is a large species of snail which runs up and
down the cabbages feeding on their leaves and is very fond of its mate.
It too has been used in telegraphy. Leave your sweetheart in Italy
when you come back home but leave her with a large piece of card-
board and take another like it for yourself. On each of these write a
number of sentences of sentiment and affection — quotations from the
poets, the finest possible to your literary taste, Browning, Tennyson,
Wordsworth, or the latest topical song — any of these will do. Then
take for yourself one of a devoted pair of snails, leaving the other with
her. At an agreed moment (standard time, making allowances for
differences of longitude) place your snail upon the card and she will
do the same with hers. Your snail will creep to any sentiment you
choose as you direct it. Hers is left free in its movements, but it will
follow the same course that its mate has chosen. Thus the sweetest
messages can be sent across the ocean. The last word of the snail in
America, ' All's well,' or ' Non ti scordar di me/ can be made to echo
sweetly on a far-off shore. This is the Parasilinic Telegraph, no in-
vention of mine, but the actual work of an ingenious i psychic adept.'

" But why use the snails ? Surely their cold slimy bodies are not
more forceful than the throbbing heart and eager brain of man.
Surely they are not more sensitive than his astral form. Let the snails
go. «They belong to the crude beginning of astral science. You have
only to sit in your room alone in darkness, and by intense thought and
irresistible volition you may set the whole ether of the world in pal-
pitation with your dreams and desires.

" To your thought the c sensitive ' you love will respond. Her astral
brain will register your ether throbs. e It is my wish ' : that is enough
for her. But you can do more than that, if we may trust the records.
Your own astral body may be sent across the ocean on the tremulous
ether and it will appear to her in her dreams or as part of her realities.
While the absence of this body may be a slight inconvenience to you,

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 139

for you must sleep or suffer while it is gone, it will be a source of joy
to her. It may plead your cause for you in a way which protoplasmic
bodies can never imitate. That this is not imagination or illusion
we have abundant testimony, if the word of man unverified by instru-
ments of precision is convincing to you. Thought and ideas, we are
told, may be ' impressed on consciousness in solid chunks without wait-
ing for words or clicks or other means of expression or for a lightning
train to convey them/ and there are thousands of records to show how
this is done.

" But you do not stop with the expression of your power over the
ether and the astral messages it is the function of the ether to carry.
You may exert control over matter itself. Mind is matter's king.
Matter is the vassal of mind. Then under the force of mind, matter
will change or vanish. Eecent experimenters claim that by gazing
at a photographic plate in the dark, an impression can be made on it.
This is the mind flashing out through the human eye. Then whatever
is in this ' mind's eye' should appear on the sensitive plate of the
camera. But greater deeds than these were done long ago, as our
honored president once pointed out, and to my mind they are told in
records better authenticated. The sagas tell us that Odin wished to
secure the golden mead of the giants that men might drink it and be
strong as they. After great labors he came to the mead. He found
that the giant Suttung had concealed it in a great stone house, to which
Odin could get no key. So Odin and his friend the giant Bauge sat
down before the house and gazed at its walls all day. By this means
they made a small hole in the rock, and changing himself into an
angle worm Odin entered the hole and at last carried the golden mead
away in triumph. The influence of this golden mead is, no doubt, still
potent in Odin's descendants whose glances have marvelous power.

" There was once a California nurseryman who had a good business
and was making money, as the phrase is. So he put aside all the fruit
trees which would sell and devoted himself to making others which
would not. Each year he trimmed his plums and apricots and lilies
and poppies, taking away the pollen which nature had provided and
putting it on flowers to which it did not belong. Each year he planted
thousands of seeds of many kinds, and when the plants came up, he
pulled up nearly all of them and burned them in a great bonfire.
Meanwhile he made no money, and lost little by little all that he began
with. Then men began to see that all fruits and nuts and flowers
changed under his hands. The plums grew very large and very juicy,
red, blue and white and more on the tree than men had ever seen before.
The lilies and the poppies and all the other flowers grew larger, the
cactus lost its thorns and the onion its odor, the chestnut bore its fruit
with its second crop of leaves and all things which he touched turned

i4o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

into something better or handsomer, and every year he pulled up nearly
all that he had and burned it in great windrows. And foolish people
said that he was a wizard and they came from great distances to see
him at his work. And there were a few who thought that they under-
stood.

" There was once an old white-haired man who came to an as-
semblage of scholars, bringing with him two bars of wood connected
by bands of iron. Fifty-three years before he had left his home on
the bay of Quinte, in Ontario, to show these bars to the world and to
give to mankind what it never had before, control over ' The Uncon-
ditioned Force of the Universe.' This force through this little ma-
chine would ' revolutionize human industry, economize human labor
and relieve human want.' ' Gentlemen,' said the old man, ' I gave
up the free and easy life of the Canadian forests, I sought my home
among the dwellers of cities, I have sacrificed fifty-three years of my
life upon the altar of my desire to benefit mankind. In three weeks
more my invention will be perfected and through these bars the un-
conditioned force of the universe will do its works for you and for me.
The time has gone by,' he said, ' when the recognition of my principle
would have pleased my ambition. I love my race, and I wish to do
them good.' Two years more went by, the unconditioned force lacked
but a few days — just one more week — of accomplishment, and in that
week the old man died in the poorhouse of Monroe County, Indiana,
and in the dust and cobwebs in an attic of a neighboring college the
model of the machine to be controlled by the unconditioned force of
the universe still awaits the touch which for the first time shall make
it run ; and there were some who called the old man a ' wizard,' and
some a ' philosopher,' and because fame has forgotten his name, I
speak it here — Eobert Havens. And in both these cases, and in all
cases, what is our test of truth?

" Not long ago, on the plains of Texas, by order of the government
of the United States, tons of gunpowder were exploded. A great noise
was made, the smoke arose to the skies, and then all was as before.
The purpose of this was to produce rain under conditions in which
common sense said rain was impossible. While these conditions re-
mained there was no rain, but the wisdom of the experiment has the
official stamp of the United States.

" Not long ago, and I am sure that the good people of Alcade will
remember this, some enterprising men had bought the dry bed of a
river in southern California. It is filled with winter floods in the
rainy season, while in summer it is white with granite sand and barren
stones. At best its boulders can only produce a scant growth of chap-
paral and cactus. Yet when it was announced that a city was to be
built on this land, men grew wild at the thought. All night they

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 141

stood in the streets of Los Angeles, each to take his turn in buying its
town lots. And the people who bought these lots were guided in one
way or another by what they termed their ' common sense.' The sense
of great wealth was in the air, and even the wisest were carried away
by it. ' The millionaire of a day ' takes the breath of his brother
millionaires.

" At Denver not long ago a man insisted that he had the gift of
healing. A wild hermit from the plains; some called him crazy and
some called him a prophet. But the gift he had, or seemed to have,
and thousands of sick people and well crowded around him to be
touched and healed. He could not touch them all so he blessed their
handkerchiefs, and his power passed over to them. Men and women
whose ills gallons of patent medicines had failed to assuage were healed
at once by these pieces of soiled cloth. And testimonials such as they
had once written for these same patent medicines, they now freely
wrote for him.

" But, after all, is there such a thing as disease ? Surely man
e made in the image of God ' is made in the image of perfection, and
what is perfect can not be marred or destroyed. May not disease be
the greatest of illusions? May not all pain be a nightmare dream
from which we should escape if we were once awakened?

" Many a school of healing has been based in one way or another
on these propositions. In a hundred different ways at a hundred dif-
ferent times men and women have found that they could heal pain by
the suggestion that pain does not exist. If pain is disease, then shall
we not heal all diseases in this way? But some say that pain is not
a disease, only a warning that disease is present or coming. Pain is
the signal that something is going wrong in the mechanism of the
human body. The signal may be unnoticed it is claimed. We then
feel no pain but the injury remains, for it is the cause of the pain and
not the pain itself. By persistently turning the mind away from these
signals of distress sent up by the bodily organs, we may come at last
to be incapable of receiving them. We are then free from pain, and
our minds may be filled with a sweet serenity very satisfactory to our-
selves. Now, which of these is true? Are we ill when we feel pain,
well when we do not? Or do we feel pain because we are ill and does
the illness pass when our feeling is gone ? May it not be true that this
is a dangerous and selfish serenity ? If it does not mean the checking
of disease, but only the closing of our eyes to its ravages, then have we
really gained anything? To turn from pain is to turn from all out-
side impressions. To close the mind to the information given by the
senses is to destroy reality, to make activity impossible, to cease to do
our duty in the world. This is to cease to grow and to become a bur-
den to our friends and a cumberer of society. There is nothing more

i42 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

noble than serenity amid trouble and distracting effort. There is
nothing more selfish than the serenity which is bred by immunity from
pain. But to many people, existence without pain, without sensation
and without action represents an ideal of the soul. Many well-to-do
women of leisure are devoting their lives to the cultivation of this
condition, and incidentally neglecting their children and driving their
husbands wild by the process. It is not alone faith in a theory of
disease or a theory of non-existence which may produce this result.
Faith in a celery-compound, an electric belt, or a mud idol may produce
the same sweet serenity, the same maddening indiffeience to all that is
real or moving in life. The walls of certain churches in Mexico are
covered with the offerings and pictures of those who were saved by
their vows or by appeals to some saint. ' But where,' said Lord Bacon,
long ago, ' are the pictures of those who were lost in spite of their
vows ? '

" It is true that to cultivate a cheerful temper, to look on the bright
side of things, to laugh when we can and be hopeful under all conditions
is good for the body. The food is better assimilated, the blood runs
faster, one can do more and better things, and come in closer relations
with the realities of life. But conversely, when one meets most man-
fully the needs of life, his pulse beats more quickly, his brain works
better, his liver gives him less trouble and he is naturally cheerful and
hopeful. The cheerful man does not dodge pain, he overcomes it. He
does not selfishly shrink from reality and turn to introspection and
dreaming. He faces the world and makes it his own and takes man-
fully the pain his efforts cause or which in the progress of life he can
not avoid.

" It is possible to go much farther in the direction of the banish-
ment of pain through the thought that pain does not exist. Then take
more pain and it will become at last an intense pleasure ; when the mind
is in the grasp of absolute torture, it is possible for the brain to feel
it as with spasms of absolute delight. It is not easy to do this but can
be produced by excessive belief in the unreality of common things. The
brain half-maddened by pain is open to suggestions from other mad-
dened brains till a fierce wild ecstasy is the final result. This fact
explains the strange rites of those sects of self-destroyers which rose in
the middle ages, the flagellantes, penitents and the rest. Even yet, the
last of the penitent brothers at San Mateo in New Mexico in the passion
week torture themselves in the most revolting fashion by crucifixion,
whipping and the binding of huge cactuses on their backs. By hideous
tortures they expiate in one week their many heinous sins of the whole
year. Just as the suggestion that disease is an illusion may conceal
pain, for those who give up everything else for healing, so does the sug-
gestion of infinite pleasure conceal for a time the most exquisite pain.
But in the one case, as I believe, the disease goes on unchecked, so in

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 143

the others, the wounds of the whip and the cactus stab remain as reali-
ties when the illusion of joy has passed by.

" In Orange County, California, there is a religious sect which finds
the old Bible of our race, the Bible of Moses and Job and Jesus and
Paul, an outworn book, no longer fitted for the aspirations of man.
This bible is still tinctured with the gospel of selfishness, for it recog-
nizes private ownership of land, and goods and men. ' To honor thy
father and mother ' implies special ownership of them, and the higher
life demands that there should be no respect of persons. There can be
no personal claims of any sort if all are to be as ' angels in heaven.'
Its command ' thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's goods ' implies the
neighbor's ownership of material things, a relation which must degrade
all who submit to it. ' To render unto Caesar the things which are
Caesar's ' is an outworn recognition of powers that be but which ought
not to be. Clearly a new bible is needed, and one of the members of
the sect sat down by a typewriter (presumably not his own property)
and wrote a bible. It was not his own composition, but that of the
Almighty, for the writer simply lent the hands with which divine
power did the work. As his fingers played over the Remington keys, he
thought of anything or everything except his writing. The result was
the book of Oahspe, the Bible of this new dispensation. And the name
of the book arose naturally. One looks up to Heaven, and he says ' Oh/
then he looks down to earth and says ' Ah/ and between Heaven and
earth is Spirit, — Oahspe !

" In the City Park of San Francisco is the wooden image of some
monstrous creature carved by the Indians of Queen Charlotte Sound to
express some phase of their mystic devotions. This image was stolen
by a Norwegian sailor. Its makers resented its loss by a series of
incantations so horrible that they took effect in the image itself. The
idol came to San Francisco, bringing sickness, shipwreck or failure to
all who touched it. Even now while it rests on a shelf in the Park
Museum in apparent quiet, its evil power is shown at night in the
smashing of vases and the overturning of bottles. Something of this,
kind takes place whenever the image is left unguarded. A man who
had charge of it for some time avers that one night the creature rose
up in living form and seized him in its clutches, and only by the most
violent efforts could he make his escape.

" When an electric current, whatever that may be, is passed through
a glass tube from which most of the air has been exhausted, various
peculiar phenomena are shown. There is an appearance of bluish light,
and from certain parts of the apparatus peculiar rays are given off
which do not appear as rays at all. Ordinary light rays pass readily
through water, glass or crystal, and we call these objects transparent.
Through wood or cloth or stone they will not pass; hence these objects
are said to be opaque. And the rays of light may be diverted from

i44 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

their course by passing at an angle from one transparent body to
another. This property, known as refraction, is the cause of the
formation of images by convex transparent bodies or lenses. But,
strangely, the rays of light above mentioned do not act like ordinary
light. All objects are transparent to them, though not in equal degree.
Not being stopped by dense bodies they are not refracted. Not being
affected by lenses they do not produce vision in the eye. As we can
not see them to the eye they are not light. But their effect on chemical
decomposition is the same as that of light. Hence while not available
for vision they can be used in photography. But not being refracted
they produce no definite image on the sensitive plate. But they may
give rise to shadows. They do not pass through all opaque objects
with equal readiness. Hence to place an opaque body between the rays
and a sensitized plate would be to cast some kind of a shadow on that
plate. The shadow means an arrest of the chemical changes which are
the basis of photography. Then if the opaque body be not in all parts
of equal density the shadow becomes deeper in some places than in
others. This gives on the photographic plate some idea of the intimate
nature of the object photographed. For the density is not merely a
matter of the surface of bodies. It pertains to the interior, which in
an opaque object can not be seen, but which nevertheless may be photo-
graphed in this fashion by these peculiar rays.

This line of investigation was lately developed in experiment by
Professor Eontgen, and the strange character of the i X-rays ' or
' cathode rays ' is now a matter known to every one. By means of these
non-refracting rays, shadow photographs can be made showing the bones
of the skeleton, imbedded bullets, the contents of a pocket-book, or any
similar hidden object which has a nature or a density unlike that of its
containing surface. These experiments of Eontgen have been varied
and verified in every conceivable way. A wonderful mythology is
growing up around them, to the confusion of those who have not paid
attention to the series of experiments which made Eontgen's discoveries
simple and inevitable.

" For example, in a thousand places the Eontgen rays and the
bacilli of disease are made to work together to fill the purse of the
enterprising physician. The doctor examines the internal organs of
the patient with the fluorescent tubes. He finds out how and where
the germs of disease are working their devastation. Then he turns the
mysterious X-rays upon these germs and they are checked in their
career of ruin : shrivelled up, it may be, under this marvelous light, as
caterpillars shrivel on a hot shovel. Another physician I know of
distributes his remedies by electric wire, one end in the bottle and the
other in the mouth of the patient, miles away. Still other physicians,
wise in their generation, use the X-rays and the microbes and the elec-
tric currents with other mysterious agencies equally for their own profit

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH M5

or comfort. Now that the X-rays have become somewhat familiar and
matter of course, the still more wonderful emanations of radium are
made to do the same things and in a fashion equally regardless of the
lessons of chemistry and of physiology. The medicine man of the
Modocs by other incantations of his own calls up the microbe of disease
which he finally spits out, a trout perhaps, or a wood-boring grub or
a small lizard — from his own mouth. There have been occult and
esoteric methods in medicine since the first Old Man of the Mountains
learned to look wise. The rabbit's foot for good luck, the cold potato
for rheumatism, celery for the nerves and sarsaparilla for the blood are
typical methods as old as humanity. But quackery and pretense does
not diminish our debt to honest medicine and surgery however much it
may tend to obscure it. Some one asked Dr. Mesmer, the great apostle
of animal magnetism, which was the form taken by ' faith cure ' in the
last century, why he ordered his patient to bathe in river water rather
than in well-water. His answer was that ' the river water was exposed
to the sun's rays.' When further asked what effect sunshine had other
than to warm the water he replied, ' Dear doctor, the reason why all
water exposed to the rays of the sun is superior to other water is
because it is magnetized — since twenty years ago I magnetized the sun ! '

" I see in the Alcalde Gazette that Madame de Silva, a prophetess
and seer of visions, seventh daughter of a seventh daughter, born with
a caul, down at the American House, is prepared to diagnose all diseases
from the examination of a lock of hair, and that Wong Chang, the
Chinese doctor, is prepared to do the same and ask no questions. How
does this differ from the power of Cuvier to draw a bird from a simple
claw or that of Agassiz who could restore a whole fish from one scale ?

" Throughout the middle ages experimenters of all grades were
engaged in the task of finding the means by which base metals could be
transmuted into gold. It was possible in the chemical laboratory to
do many things which seemed equally difficult and to the common mind
far more mysterious. Jn the philosophy of the day, and perhaps in our
own time as well, there was every reason to believe that the transmuta-
tion of metals was possible. But it never was accomplished and many
a learned alchemist went to his grave, the work of his life a confessed
failure.

" Yet this very day, the daily press, which is responsible for so much
of spurious science and mental confusion, gives the record of successful
alchemy. One famous metallurgist of world-wide reputation (all these
men have ' a world-wide reputation with one another'), has subjected
silver to great pressure till it becomes yellow, soft and heavy just like
gold. All the difference is in the density — 16 to 1. Condensed silver
is gold, so the newspaper maintains, and the problem of alchemy is
solved at last. By these experiments, six ounces of silver make but
VOL. lxx. — 10.

146 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

four ounces of gold, one third of the substance being somehow lost in
the process. But with improved appliances this third should be saved
and the finances of the world may be reconstructed on a basis of
genuine bimetallism, gold being made when wanted from the condensa-
tion of silver. Yet all-important as this discovery should be, neither
chemistry nor finance pays any attention to it. It belongs to the science
of the newspaper having only the validity of a ' fake advertisement/
' Common sense ' demands that the experiments be verified and the
steps which led to them be made known before considering for a moment
the probability that there is any truth in the newspaper statement.

" Now how amid all the wonders of science, non-science dreaming,
f akery and insanity is the common man to find his way ? How shall he
recognize the claims of science among all the other voices and noises in
this vociferous world?

" This is my answer, and I believe that it is the answer of science.
As to many things the common man may not know at all. Where he
is not concerned in any way so that error and truth are alike to him
because they can not affect his action, he may be powerless to decide.
It is not always important that he should decide. ' I do not know ' is
the affirmation characteristic of the wise man. It is safe to believe
mildly in mahatmas and norms and hoodoos and voudous if one does
not regulate his life according to this belief. The vague faith in proto-
plasm, in natural selection or in microbes which the average man
possesses will serve him no better if it is put to no test. The difference
appears when one acts upon his belief. The nearer one's acquaintance
with molecules or protoplasm, the more real and more natural do they
appear. The microbe is as authentic as the cabbage to one engaged
in dealing with it. Protoplasm is as tangible a thing as wheat or
molasses. But the astral body and the telepathic impulse become the
more vague the nearer we approach them. They are figments of the
fancy, and their names serve only as a cover for our ignorance of the
facts. The charm of such words as Karma, Avatar and Kismet lies
in the fact that most of those who use them have no idea of what they
mean. Lack of meaning or ignorance of meaning lies at the founda-
tions of most occultism. Scientific induction in its essence is simply
common sense. The homely maxims of human experience are the
beginnings of science. To know enough ' to come in when it rains ' is
to know something of the science of meteorology. By scanning the
clouds we may know how to come in before it rains. By observing the
winds we may tell what clouds are coming. By studying the barometer
we may know from what quarter the winds and clouds may be expected.

" The discoveries of science are made by steps which are perfectly
simple to those trained to follow them. No discovery is made by
chance in our day. None come to contradict existing laws or to dis-
credit existing knowledge. The whole of no phenomenon is known

IN SEARCH OF TRUTH 147

to man. The whole truth never can be. Ultimate truth was never
in any man's possession. The unknown surrounds on all sides all
knowledge in man's possession. The beginning, the end and the rami-
fications are beyond his reach. He was not present when the founda-
tions of the universe were laid. He may not be present when they are
destroyed. But scientific knowledge, though limited, is practical and
positive so far as it goes. It rests on experiment and observation alone.
Every step in observation, experiment or induction has been tested by
thousands of bright minds. He is already a master in science who can
suggest even one new experiment. There is nothing occult or uncanny
in scientific methods. The e magic wand ' which creates new species
of horses or cattle lies in the hand of any stock-breeder. The magic
key of the electrician by which the foam of the cataract becomes the
light of the city may be held by any municipal council. To take the
illustrations given above, ' there is such a thing as a squash,' because
the assumption that the squash exists constitutes a safe basis for action.
On that hypothesis you can plant squashes or raise squashes or make
them into pies. The brightness of the brandy-colored world we can
not trust. It requires no scientific instruments of precision to record
the failure of the man who guides his life on a basis of impressions
made by drugs or stimulants.

" The transit of Venus is no product of fancy. To the astronomer
the coming of the planet between the earth and the sun is as certain a
thing as the coming of the earth into its own shadow at night. The
one incident is more common than the other, but not more mysterious.
And to go to that part of the earth which is turned toward the sun at
the moment of transit is the simple common sense thing to do if one
wishes to see the transit. The island, the abandoned hut and the cook-
ing utensils were only incidents to the astronomer. To the natives
these were the only realities and the purposes of sciences were to them
unknown or absurd. To the man of common sense the digging for
treasure under the direction of clairvoyants seems ridiculous. The
operation does not become more wise when we see it through the eye
of science. Tested by instruments of precision, ' clairvoyance ' be-
comes a myth and such truth as its phenomena contains is explainable
in simple ways.

" The spectroscope grows more real and more potent as we study its
methods and results. The divining rod is only successful through
ignorance or fraud. The process of weighing planets is open to all
who will continue their studies till they understand it. The test of
knowing is doing. The oceanic cable in the service of all who have
concerns in another continent. It hides no mystery save the one
eternal mystery of matter and force. The phenomena of telepathy
have fled before every attempt at experiment. The study of the ' X-
rays ' is as far from occultism or spiritism as the manufacture of brass

148 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

is from the incarnation of mahatmas. The mind healer, the faith
healer, the curative theories of 'neminism/ the sale of the patent
medicine, the medical marvels of radium, the wonders of the electric
belt and the power of animal magnetism are all witnesses of the potency
of suggestion in the untrained mind. To the same class of phenomena
the witch-hazel rod belongs. Experiment shows that its movements
are the involuntary muscular contractions and that these follow simply
the preconceived notions of the holder of the rod.

" If, as some one has lately said, all men sought healing from the
blessed handkerchief of the lunatic or from contact with old bones or
old clothes, if all physicians used ' revealed remedies ' for the remedies
nature suggests for each disease, if all the supposed ' natural rights '
of men were recognized in legislation, the insecurity of such actions
would speedily disappear. The long and bloody road of progress
through fool-killing would for centuries be traversed again. Without
the instruments and methods of precision which belong to science we
should find ourselves in the weakness and babyhood which was the
heritage of the common man through the middle ages.

" In the degree that ' organized common sense ' or science, has been
a factor in the lives of men and nations, men and nations have been
happy and effective. The ultimate function of science is the regula-
tion of human conduct.

" Not long since one of our sciosophical friends proposed the theory
that the chemical elements were each of them forms of ' latent oxygen.'
This theory he defended by the argument that the business of science
was to propose all sorts of theories. As some apples on a tree will be
sound so will some of these theories be true. To make every con-
ceivable guess is the way to hit on the truth. Some such notion as this
is common among cultured people of all countries. To accept it is to
ignore the whole history of science. No advance in real knowledge
has come from guessing, dreaming or speculating. If we want a pic-
ture taken we find a man who has a camera and who knows how to use
it. If we want the truth on any subject we must find a man who has
the instruments or methods of precision and who knows how to use
them. There is no other way. As well expect a man without a
camera and who knows not how to use it if he had one to take a photo-
graph as to trust to a speculator, guesser or dreamer to find the truth.
To work without tools, in the world of objective reality, can yield only
illusion and fraud."

At the conclusion of the address, President Marvin expressed the
thanks of the Astral Club for the bold and straightforward declara-
tion of materialistic principles. But at the same time he could not
refrain from reminding Mr. Grimshaw that he was still very young
and that there were many things in heaven and earth and Devachan
which are not yet taught in the schools.

IS MAN AN AUTOMATION 149

IS MAN AN AUTOMATON?

By Professor GEORGE STUART FULLERTON

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

IT' EW things are more irritating to the average man, who does not
-*- pretend to be a philosopher or a scientist, but respects the
opinions of such, than to be told, by those whose word seems to carry
authority, that he must regard himself as an automaton.

He has been accustomed to consider his own mind and the minds
of his neighbors as of no little significance in the system of things.
He says that he rose early, because he knew he had a long day's work
before him; he took his bath, because he knew it was good for his
health; he went to the dining-room, because he wanted his breakfast;
he ran for the train, because he did not care to lose five minutes wait-
ing for another; he whistled, that the conductor might hear him and
might be induced to delay a moment; he climbed the stairs to his
office, because the elevator seemed to be intolerably long in coming.

So it went all through the day. He did things because he wanted
to, or because he thought he had to. Other men about him did things
for the same reasons. His whole day seems to have been full of
thoughts and feelings, plans and decisions; nor can he bring himself
to believe that, had these been different, his actions and those of
other men would have been what they were. So unequivocally does his
experience appear to testify to all this, that it does not even occur to
him to raise a question, until some professional questioner suggests a
doubt.

But he spends the evening of such a day in his library, and, as
he turns over the pages of certain volumes of scientific essays, his eye
is caught by Professor Huxley's statement that " our mental condi-
tions are simply the symbols in consciousness of the changes which take
place automatically in the organism." If he is startled by this, his
mind is by no means quieted when he turns to Professor Clifford and
reads : " Thus we are to regard the body as a physical machine which
goes by itself according to a physical law, that is to say, is automatic.
An automaton is a thing which goes by itself when it is wound up, and
we go by ourselves when we have had food."

To be sure, each of these writers softens the blow somewhat. Hux-
ley tells us that we are conscious automata ; and Clifford says that the
body is not merely a machine, because consciousness goes with it.
Nevertheless, this does not seem to make good the previous wrong. If

150 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

a man tells me that I am an imbecile, and then modifies the statement
by adding that I am a particular kind of an imbecile, it still rankles
in my breast that I am an imbecile; and I am naturally impelled to
inquire into the justice of applying the title to me at all. I may not
call a young lady a doll, and then soften the blow by explaining that I
have somewhat extended the signification of that common word. One
has" a right to ask : Is the word, when so extended in meaning, rightly
applied at all? Are dolls that think and speak, feel and will, and all
the rest, really dolls? If not, why use the word, except as a figure of
speech, and with insulting intent?

Now, it would be absurd to maintain that Huxley or Clifford or any
other serious adherent of ' the automaton theory ' has written with the
intention of insulting or degrading mankind. These men had a
glimpse of what they regarded as a valuable scientific truth, and they
urged it upon the attention of their fellows. In doing so, however;
they made use of expressions which have actually given offence to
many, and have predisposed men to a rejection of their doctrine. I
feel like going further and saying that the mere fact that they have
seen fit to use such expressions may be taken as an indication that they
have not fully grasped the significance of the truth they were endeavor-
ing to express, but have themselves slipped into a misconception, which
has harmed their cause.

I may say at the outset that I regard the cause as a good one. This
does not in the least mean that I believe in any ' automaton theory/
The name is a grotesque and an offensive one, and should never have
been used. The plain man is quite right in refusing to regard him-
self as an automaton. The real cause for which the so-called autom-
atists, have been fighting is a clear and unambiguous conception of
the relation between the mental and the physical — one which will not
rub out the distinction between the two, but will do it full justice. In
the present paper I shall try to show that the frank acceptance of their
fundamental thesis need not make a man an automatist at all; nor
need it compel him to modify the estimate which his experience has
led him to form of the significance of men's actions. In other words,
the man may become as ' scientific ' as he pleases, without on that
account being forced to repudiate common sense and common experi-
ence. Surely this is no small gain.

We all have experience of the relations which obtain between mind
and body, or we should not even know that we have minds and bodies.
But those who have not devoted special attention to psychology and
philosophy are apt to have the vaguest of notions as to what the
relations in question are. We have, to be sure, gotten beyond the crude
materialism that once led men to regard the mind as consisting of five
round atoms, disseminated through the body, and inhaled from the

IS MAN AN AUTOMATION 151

atmosphere. But I am not sure that most persons would not be in-
clined to maintain that the mind is in the body ' somehow ' — and when
we inquire into the significance of this * somehow/ we can scarcely fail
to discover that it has a material flavor. Whether rightly or wrongly,
most men think of the mind as in the body in somewhat — but only
somewhat — the same way as material atoms may be in the body. And
he who thinks of the mind in this way may, if the question occur to
him at all, assume that mind and body interact somewhat as two ma-
terial things interact with each other.

To be sure, the more one reflects upon the difference between mental
phenomena and physical, the more vague and indefinite this ' some-
what ' seems to become. Material things can lie beside one another in
space; they can approach one another and recede from one another.
Their interaction is a thing to be described in physical terms ; we have
to do with space and motions in space. Have we anything analogous
to this when we are considering, let us say, the mental image of a rail-
way station and those physical changes in the brain which antecede my
moving my feet in the direction of the station ? Is the mental image
literally in any part of the brain? Can it approach or recede from
any group of molecules? Does it mean anything to say that it lies
between this physical occurrence and that? And if the relation be-
tween what is mental and what is physical is really so different from
the relation between two physical things, must we not recognize that the
word ' interaction ' is ambiguous when it is applied indiscriminately
to either relation?

As early as the seventeenth century reflection upon the differences
which distinguished the mental and the physical led to the conclusion
that it is impossible that ideas should be inserted as links in any phy-
sical chain of events. You can not plant an imaginary tree in a real
ten-acre lot ; you can not insert the thought of a cork into the neck of
a real bottle; is it more sensible to say that the thought of a railway
station may be inserted as a link in a series of changes in the nervous
system of a man ? To such men as Huxley and Clifford it seemed that
the physical series must be regarded as unbroken. Clifford, much in-
fluenced by the philosopher Spinoza, describes the relation between
physical changes in the brain and the accompanying ideas as a
' parallelism/ as a correspondence or concomitance. It is scarcely
necessary to add that neither he nor any later parallelist has intended
the word c parallelism ' to be taken literally. It only means that mental
phenomena are to be regarded as excluded from the series of physical
changes, and yet as accompanying them.

Now, I think we may leave out of consideration those who endeavor
to steer a middle course — to eat their cake and, at the same time, to
keep it. The question is: Is the series of physical changes to be re-

152 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

garded as unbroken, and are mental phenomena to be looked upon as
the invariable concomitants of certain physical changes; or are the
two classes of facts to be built into the one series? Those who accept
the first alternative are parallelists, and those who accept the second
are interactionists.

Naturally, there is a lively quarrel between the two sects. The
parallelist insists that the interactionist has no clear notion of what
he means by interaction, when he uses the word ; and he maintains that,
did the interactionist realize his position, he would see himself to be
little better than a materialist. He has failed to recognize the great
distinction between mental phenomena and physical. On the other
hand, the interactionist insists that the parallelist, in declaring the
series of physical changes to be unbroken, has reduced the mind to a
position of utter insignificance. Every action can be accounted for by
going back to its physical causes, and to those alone. The mind, then,
is a mere decoration; it does nothing; the man is a physical autom-
aton, etc., etc.

I am not going to try to persuade any one, in this paper, to become
an adherent of either the one sect or the other. But it does seem
rather hard that those who watch the combat should be led to suppose
that, with the triumph of the one party, they are condemned to be-
come materialists, and, with the triumph of the other, they are turned
into automata. It is distressing to be confronted with Scylla and
Charybdis, and to see no clear water between.

What I wish to prove is that the whole matter is one to be re-
garded with no other emotion than that of intellectual curiosity; and
that it does not matter a particle to the plain man, from the practical
point of view, which side wins.

First let us assume that the interactionist is right. Then ideas and
motions in matter may be regarded as belonging to the one series —
they are links in the one chain. Now, one can not piece out a defective
series of sounds by the insertion of a smell ; one can not, when one tree
in an avenue has died, replace it by a tree in a dream. To constitute
a series, in any significant sense of the word, things must have some-
thing in common; it must mean something to speak of gaps and inser-
tions. Let us suppose, for the sake of argument, that it does mean
something here, and that ideas are enough like motions in matter to
be inserted between certain motions in matter and to form one series
with them.

This may be a form of materialism; but what of that? The man
whose day has been full of ideas, of desires and volitions, of plans and
purposes, has had just the day that he has had; and the fact that all
these are called material or semi-material does not prevent their being
just what he has experienced them to be. If some material things can

IS MAN AN AUTOMATION 153

be like this, and can play such an important part in his life, he should
get over his repugnance to materialism, or at any rate to some sorts
of materialism; and he may go on thinking and talking about himself
and his neighbors much as he has thought and talked in the past. It
is not worth while to be frightened by a mere word; a cold in the
head is not made worse when it is given a Latin name.

It may be said, it is a waste of time to try to protect men against
the fear that interactionism may be proved true, for men have no dread
of this result, as it is. This I think we must admit. Those who are
familiar with the history of psychology and philosophy know that
there was a time when it was not repugnant to men to conceive the
mind as literally a kind of matter, having its place in the body just
as any other kind of matter has its place. Gradually it came to be
felt that this was a misconception, and various curious attempts were
made to describe the mind as immaterial. To-day nearly every one
is willing to say that the mind is immaterial — the conception has be-
come common property. Nevertheless, he who is clear-sighted can
see that most men have not wholly stripped away materialistic sug-
gestions inherited from the past; and he finds these embodied in the
interactionist doctrine. As, however, interactionism does not ask the
plain man to be more materialistic than he is naturally inclined to
be — every one can find a comfortable seat in so roomy a place as a
' somehow ' — it does not arouse his apprehensions. So I shall not
spend more time in allaying fears which do not arise in most minds,
but shall turn to the ' parallelist ' doctrine. Its supposed terrors con-
stitute our proper theme.

Let us suppose that the parallelist is right. Then ideas and motions
in matter must be regarded as belonging to two distinct series, and
they must not be made links in the one chain. Thus, a pin is thrust
into my leg; I reach down to it and pull it out with my fingers. A
series of changes has taken place in my body. Some message has been
sent from my leg, along certain nerves, to the brain, and a message has
been sent along other nerves to the muscles of my arm and hand. But
this does not say everything. I have felt a pain; I have been con-
scious of the injury done my leg; I have wished to remove the pin;
I have resolved to do so, and am conscious that I do it. The physical
series is an unbroken one; the mental phenomena are concomitants
of brain changes, but fill no gaps between them.

Now, if we admit all this, must we sadly accept the following
doleful results?

1. Man must be regarded as an automaton.

2. Man's mind is insignificant; as his body does all that is to be
done, we may say that the result would have been the same had he
had no mind.

154 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Hence, we ought to abandon our usual ways of thinking and
speaking about ourselves and others.

If these results actually do follow from an acceptance of parallelism,
men may well feel apprehensive when they see able men advocate it.
If none of them follow, there is small cause for apprehension, and the
question becomes one of merely scientific interest.

Let us consider the first point. Must the parallelist regard man
as an automaton?

Before one can decide this point intelligently one must know what
the word ' automaton ' means. He who consults his dictionary is in-
formed that it means ' that which is self-moving, or has the power of
spontaneous movement, but is not conscious.' A little lower down it is
explained to him that the term more specifically denotes ' an apparatus
in which the purposely concealed power is made to imitate the volun-
tary or mechanical motions of living beings, such as men, horses, birds,
fishes,' etc. He is further given to understand that the word may be
applied to ' a person or an animal whose actions are purely involun-
tary or mechanical,' or to a person who acts ' without active intelli-
gence, especially without being fully aware of what he is doing.'

Do any of these definitions cover the case of the man described in
the first paragraphs of this paper? Was he without consciousness?
Was he constructed to imitate the actions of a living being? Were
his actions involuntary? Did he go through his day without active
intelligence? Yet the definitions are very fair, and do not misrepre-
sent the actual use of the word defined. Even in psychology, when we
speak of i automatisms,' we never have in mind a shrewdly planned
raid upon the bourse, or the production of Caesar's ' Commentaries.'

The fact that I choose to pin my faith to one view of the relation
between mind and body rather than to another gives me no right to
wrest words from their proper uses and to employ them in ways that
must be misleading. Normal man is not an automaton in any legiti-
mate sense of the word; and it is a grave injustice to parallelism to
call it ' the automaton theory.' To be sure, Clifford and others have
invited the injustice which has been visited upon them, and we can
scarcely pity them as much as though it were wholly unmerited. But
the frankest adherence to their parallelism need not induce us to call
man an automaton. To say that consciousness is ' parallel ' to brain
changes is not equivalent to saying that consciousness is not present
at all, or is present in defective measure.

And now for the second point. Must the parallelist regard man's
mind as insignificant, and say that his actions would be the same if he
had no mind?

Surely not. Bear in mind what parallelism maintains. It main-
tains that mental phenomena and certain cerebral changes are invariable

IS MAN AN AUTOMATION 155

concomitants. This means that a given idea can not exist unless there
is a certain brain-change. But it also means that the brain-change
in question can not possibly exist unless the corresponding idea exists.
The relation between the two is not conceived to be an accidental one.
For reasons which have been indicated, the parallelist objects to calling
it a causal relation, and prefers the word ' concomitance.' Nevertheless,
he regards the relation as one on which we may depend absolutely —
as absolutely as we can depend upon the relation between a physical
cause and its effect.

But, if this is so, the plain man may perfectly well become a
parallelist and yet go on talking as though certain results could not
be brought about in the absence of minds. He is quite justified in
maintaining that no clever book could ever be written, no such day
as his has been ever lived through, by a creature without a mind.
He may, if he choose, leave to the scholar by profession the question
whether the word ' cause ' is not somewhat loosely used in common life.
What he cares about stands firm on any hypothesis: ideas are signifi-
cant; if he can work out a satisfactory plan in his mind, desirable
results will be achieved ; if he has not the ideas, the results will *D.ot
follow.

Now for the last point. Should the parallelist abandon our usual
ways of thinking and speaking about ourselves and others ? It must be
admitted that the words used by some parallelists suggest, at least, that
he should do so.

" An automaton is a thing that goes by itself when it is wound up,
and we go by ourselves when we have had food." The suggestion
certainly is that, if we want men to function, we should feed them.

It has been known, of course, from time immemorial, and in every
country under heaven, that men who get no food at all will soon cease
to go; and it has been known also that men who get too much drink
will first go irregularly and then not at all. It is an old secret that
what goes into the mouth of a man is not a matter of indifference.

But did any man, parallelist or interactionist, ever try to control the
actions of his fellow man in detail by the giving of food? or try to
explain why Mrs. Smith visits Mrs. Brown and neglects Mrs. Jones,
by investigating the diet of that discriminating lady? We can not
explain her taking the longer walk through the park rather than the
shorter one along the street, by pointing out that she has legs. If she
were unprovided with these members, she would undoubtedly not walk
at all; but her having them does not enlighten us as to her choice of
a walk, nor does it give any key to the control of her actions.

Clifford himself never tried to make men e go ' by the administra-
tion of food; he wound them up by public lectures and by printed
essays, when he wanted them to think as he did and to act as he wished

156 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

them to. The truth is that the brain-changes which correspond to
mental states are unknown; we have not the least conception how the
brain-change of a man meditating a gift to a hospital and that of a
man planning to rob a bank differ from one another. Nor have we any
direct physical means of producing either. But we do know a good
deal about men's minds, and we know how to arouse in them ideas
which will — directly or indirectly, it does not matter which — result in
definite actions.

The plain man is, then, quite right in explaining his day by a
reference to ideas. We have no other way of explaining it. There is
no reason for changing our usual modes of expression. The parallelist
who calls himself an automatist, or who talks of winding men up by the
administration of food harms his own cause gratuitously. There is
nothing in parallelism, properly understood, to cause apprehension ; and
there is nothing about the doctrine that is startling.

It seems right that, having criticized that very clear and charming
writer, Clifford, I should close with a word in his defense. It is very
easy, when a doctrine is relatively new, and has not been subjected to
careful criticism, to misconceive its full significance. Were Clifford
alive to-day, I do not believe that he would call man an automaton at
all. He would see, I think, that it is misleading to speak so. But he
would still be a parallelist, and he would gain the more adherents to his
interesting scientific hypothesis, in that his utterances would be less
calculated to shock the common sense of his fellow men.

A VOCABULARY TEST i57

A VOCABULARY TEST

By Professor E. A. KIRKPATR1CK

FITCHBURG STATE NORMAL SCHOOL

OF all the inventions of the human race nothing compares in im-
portance, as regards mental development, with language. In
the development of each person also, nothing exercises a greater in-
fluence in molding and developing thought and feeling than his
language environment. The vocabulary of a person represents in a
condensed and symbolic form all that he has experienced and imagined.
The breadth of his mental experience is indicated by the number of
words that have for him a meaning, while the accuracy of his thinking
is shown by the constancy and exactness of meaning with which he
uses words. The study of vocabularies ought therefore to be an im-
portant branch of psychological investigation.

Studies have been made of the number of words used by great
writers, and by children a few years old. The latter studies have
shown that a child may not use words that are perfectly familiar to
him for months merely because he has no occasion to use them, e. g.,
words frequently uttered in the summer or when in the country may
never be used in the city or in the winter. Adults are familiar with
many words that they have rarely, perhaps never, used. The difficul-
ties in the way of counting accurately the number of words used by
an adult or even by a child over three years of age are almost insur-
mountable.

When we attempt to estimate the number of words that have a
meaning for an individual, the difficulties are less although the num-
ber of words is much greater. The writer long ago estimated the
number of words in his own vocabulary by going carefully through
an unabridged dictionary and counting the number of familiar words
on every tenth page (see Science, 0. S., Vol. XVIII., pp. 107-108).
Since then he has often had his students estimate the number of con-
cepts that they possessed by counting the number of words that had
for them a fairly definite meaning, on a few pages of the dictionary,
and then calculating from the proportion of familiar words the total
number of words they knew.

When a student began, say on page 2, and counted all the words
in bold-faced type and the number of these known on every fiftieth
page, and then did the same beginning with page 20, the results were

158 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

so nearly the same as to convince me that the method was fairly
accurate. Some preliminary tests were then made that showed that
a hundred words taken by chance from various parts of the dictionary
might serve as a fairly accurate measure of the size of one's understand-
ing vocabulary. The words used in the final test consisted of fifty
words taken from the first four words on every fiftieth page of Webster's
academic dictionary and fifty words from the first of other pages leav-
ing out different forms of the same root word (e. g., photograph, photog-
rapher). This was done with the thought that older persons might
be able to infer better the meaning of unfamiliar words than younger
persons. The results were negative and the author now considers
that the best list of words is obtained from Webster's academic dic-
tionary (which contains about 28,000 words on 645 pages), by taking
the first, second, or last word, or any other definite word on every sixth
page. For general purposes and for all ages this is probably better
than to take a hundred words from an unabridged dictionary which
contains so many various and obsolete forms of the same words, along
with rare words, and technical terms not found in the smaller dic-
tionary. Estimates based on words from the academic dictionary give
less than half as many words in the vocabulary as those based on
data from the unabridged, but they are more representative of funda-
mentally different concepts.

The method of using the test was to place the printed list before
the subjects and ask them to mark the words that they knew with a
plus (-{-) sign, those that they did not know with a minus ( — ) sign,
and doubtful ones with a question mark (?). The tests which num-
bered about two thousand were made chiefly upon pupils from the
fourth grade up through the high school and university, although a few
were made upon younger children. Control tests showed that if the
same test was given orally, there was some difference in the words
marked as known and unknown. This difference was of course very
great in the second and third grades, where a few tests were made,
and became less with age, yet it usually amounted even in the case
of adults to from one to three per cent. In a few individuals the
difference was quite marked.

The reason for this is that some words are more often heard than
others, while others are more often seen, hence in one case the audi-
tory stimulus arouses familiar associations while in the other case the
visual stimulus is more effective. In general the auditory stimulus"
is more effective for children, but, as they read more, the visual stimulus
becomes more effective and later many words are seen that are rarely
or never heard; hence for such words the visual stimulus is the most
effective and sometimes the only stimulus which will produce the
reaction of familiarity. The test is more accurate if both forms of

A VOCABULARY TEST 159

stimuli are used, i. e., the words pronounced as the pupils look at
them.

There is another cause of difference and also of inaccuracy. In the
auditory test unfamiliar words are often mistaken for familiar ones
having a similar sound, e. g., barque for bark, baron for barren, and
in the visual test similarity of appearance plays a similar part. A
striking case of this form of error was made by a third grade boy who
marked the word amaranth as known. I said to him, ' You don't
know that word, do you ? ' He said, ' Yes/ in a tone that implied
surprise that I should question it. I then said, ' What is the word ? '
He replied, ' Arithmetic' Another boy for similar reasons, partly
visual and partly auditory, marked ' eschar ' as known and when ques-
tioned called it ' sister/

On the other hand, young children often do not mark words that
are perfectly familiar to them, because the sounds and forms without
any other stimuli of suggesting words or circumstances are not suf-
ficient to immediately arouse the sense of familiarity. One second
grade boy who marked only eighteen words in the test, when questioned,
showed by synonyms or definitions, or illustrations, that he knew the
meaning of thirty of the words.

Individual habits of thinking or judging is probably the largest
factor in tending to make the marking of words an unreliable index
of the actual mental furniture of the subject of the test. Some mark
as known every word that arouses the feeling of familiarity, while
others mark as known only those for which they are confident they can
give a correct definition. The differences in this respect are, how-
ever, most shown in the doubtful marks while the plus mark usually
means the arousal of a specific idea by the word form. This idea may
be vague or distinct, narrow or broad, general or detailed, correct or
incorrect, but it is the idea usually aroused by the word.

Upon defining a list of words to a class of normal students after
they had marked them, it was found that the errors in marking words
as known and unknown usually cancelled each other, so that the
number finally reported as known and unknown was for most members
of the class about the same as when they were first marked.

Instruction as to what shall be the standard for deciding whether
a word is known, such as " Count as known all words that you would
not, as to their meaning, need to look up in a dictionary if you saw
them in a sentence," helps to render the marking more uniform.
Another and more accurate method of bringing about uniformity of
standard is to ask the pupils to define or put in sentences some of the
words, then to mark the rest according as they think themselves able
or unable to indicate their meaning.

If students are asked to define a certain proportion of the words

i6o

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

as accurately as possible, giving all meanings where there are more
than one, depth and accuracy as well as breadth of knowledge may be
tested. In college classes where twenty of the hundred words were
defined, 114 out of 246 students were found to have denned the same
proportion of words that they marked as known and only seventeen
showed a difference of as much as three words of the twenty from the
corresponding proportion of the hundred words marked. The over-
estimations slightly exceeded the under estimations.

The author is convinced that one hundred words selected
as has been described and marked with care gives sufficient
basis for an approximate estimate of the size of the understanding
vocabulary of college and high-school students, and of the higher
grades of the grammar school. In the author's own classes where
students were ranged in three grades according to the number of words
marked as known in one list of words, other lists of words similarly
selected resulted in 60 per cent, to 80 per cent, of them being again
in the same grade, while none were changed from the lowest to the
highest grade.

Using Webster's Academic Dictionary as a basis it appears from
averaging about two thousand papers that the size of vocabularies are
likely to approximate the following:

Grade II 4,480

Grade IV 7,020

Grade VI 8,700

Grade VIII 12,000

High School.

Freshmen 15,640

Junior 17,600

Grade III 6,620

Grade V 7,860

Grade VII 10,660

Grade IX 13,400

Sophomore 16,020

Senior 18,720

The average for normal school students is 19,000 and for college
students 20,120. The colleges represented in this test were Bryn Mawr,
Smith, Columbia, Brown University and Pratt Institute, while the
grades and high schools were mostly in Massachusetts cities.

There seems to be no constant difference between the sexes. On
only a part of the papers was age given, but there is reason to believe
that vocabularies increase up to thirty. In Pratt Institute where
students varied greatly in age, those above twenty-five knew from five
to ten per cent, more words than those in the same classes who were
below twenty years of age. It is not likely that the growth of vocabu-
lary is great after thirty, when deeper specialized and executive activi-
ties have taken the place of general advancement into new fields of
knowledge and many words once known are forgotten.

One important factor in the growth of vocabularies was investigated
by accompanying the list of words with a request to write names of

A VOCABULARY TEST 161

papers and magazines frequently read and of books read since the
beginning of the year. It was found that in general those who named
the most books and magazines had the larger vocabularies, regardless of
their grade.

The individual differences in size of vocabulary were very great,
some ninth grade children falling to the rank of second grade children,
while some third or fourth grade children ranked with the average of
those in the ninth grade or high school.

Sometimes a very small vocabulary was accounted for by the fact
that the child was of foreign parentage and did not hear English at
home, but the mere fact of being of foreign parentage was no assurance
that the vocabulary would be small.

The relation of size of vocabulary to school standing was considered,
but owing to the scarcity of data and uncertainty as to its reliability
(only a small proportion of the papers were accompanied by the class
records or teacher's estimate of ability), no conclusive results were
reached. In the grades there was no clear proof of relationship
though in one room, where there was reason to think the teacher's
estimate had been carefully made, the grading corresponded almost
exactly to the size of the vocabularies. In one normal class nearly all
of those who had been named by the faculty as belonging to the lower
third of the class had small vocabularies. In another class there
seemed to be little or no relation between size of vocabulary and
estimates of teaching ability. In two colleges, one for women, the
other for men, the marks given to the women in English and to men
in all subjects were secured for the freshman class and compared with
the number of words known. The average number of words known
by the men who in general ranked in the various subjects above the
average of their class was 5 per cent, greater than for those ranking
below the average; while the women who ranked highest in English,
averaged nearly 4 per cent, better in vocabularies than those who
ranked lowest in English.

In the case of individuals there was often a wide divergence be-
tween the marks and the size of the vocabulary. In some instances
exceptionally poor definitions indicated a difference in the standard
used in marking words as known, but not always. This divergence is
not, however, greater than between marks in different subjects, e. g.,
students have honor marks in some subjects and fail to pass in others.

Is size of vocabulary any indication of attainment or ability? An
affirmative answer to this can not readily be proved by experiment, be-
cause we have no reliable standard of ability and attainment by which
the value of the vocabulary test may be determined. It is well known,

VOL. LXX. — 11.

1 62 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

however, that persons who do well in one subject often do poorly in
others and that success in life after school bears little relation to
success in school. It has recently been shown by Dr. Thorndike that
entrance examinations bear little relation to college marks.

From the side of experimental psychology, no accurate measure of
intellectual ability has been established in spite of many persistent
and painstaking researches. The various tests used are found to be
special in their character. There are also indications that what are
good tests at one age or stage of development may have no significance
at another stage. Sensory and motor tests are probably valuable in-
dications of mental ability in young children, memory and imagina-
tion tests in older children and reasoning tests in youths.

The function of the nervous system is to respond in an appropriate
way to the various phases of the stimulating environment. The most
common phase of environment to which human beings respond is the
word environment, first to auditory words by movements, then to audi-
tory and visual words by images and concepts. The number of words
that are known by any person depends upon two factors, the variety in
his word environment, auditory and visual, and his own readiness to
respond to the various elements of this environment. It is perfectly
natural therefore that children who are surrounded by intellectual
people or who read a great deal should have large vocabularies and yet
that the size of individual vocabularies should vary with their readi-
ness to respond to this word environment. The accuracy of response
or quality of knowledge can be judged not by the number of words
but by the accuracy of definitions or use of words.

The question naturally arises whether size of vocabulary and ability
to define and use words is not a sufficiently accurate measure of the
intellectual ability of youths to justify the use of vocabulary tests in
examinations for entrance to college. College work is supposed to be
general in its character, demanding general ability, of which the
vocabulary test ought to give an indication. Of course if students
should devote their time to a special study of the dictionary, the test
would become special and valueless, since size of vocabulary would not
then be an accompaniment and indication of experiences and intel-
lectual advances, but of special study of modes of defining words in
terms of other word symbols.

Ill

A study of the kind of definitions given by persons of different
ages is an interesting indication of the sources of word knowledge and
of the modes of thought at different ages.

The first words are of course obtained from direct association with
acts and objects and this continues to be a source of vocabulary growth.

A VOCABULARY TEST 163

A large proportion of words, however, come indirectly from experience
through the medium of words that have already become familiar.
These new words are sometimes received as equivalents of other words,
because of synonyms and definitions or of special descriptions. The
greater part of them, however, gain their significance from their
association with familiar words in various situations, just as the
original words were gained from association with various real situa-
tions.

These truths may be illustrated by the definitions of gourd given
by college students. e A drinking cup made from the gourd vine.' ' A
vegetable which grows in the ground having a hard shell and many
seeds.' ' A vessel for holding water or other liquid.' ' A receptacle
for carrying water about, usually of skin.' ' A water bottle made
from a pumpkin or squash.' ' Vessel sometimes made by scooping out,
for example, making a vessel by scooping out a pumpkin.' Evidently
most of these definitions represent ideas gained from sentences in
which the word, ' gourd ' is used, though those who speak of them as
1 pumpkins ' or as a ' summer squash,' may have seen the real thing
without the discriminating eye of the gardener or botanist. The idea
that it is a vessel of some kind evidently predominates and this idea
is sufficient for interpreting most sentences in which the word occurs.

It is interesting to notice the various forms of the subordinate idea
of the object itself as the various persons picture it under the stimulus
of the context. ' A shell of certain nuts, fruits and vegetables, or of
the cocoanut, squash, cucumber, etc' l In many countries it is used
as a receptacle for food and drink.' ( A fruit on a tree whose shell
is used for carrying water.' ' The dry fruit of some sort of tropical
tree.' ' It is hard and round, and some are the size of an apple and
rattle when you shake them.' ' A species of dried melon.' i An old
style wooden drinking vessel.' ' A hollow piece of cane.' ' A fruit
characterized by the fibrous outer shell similar to the cocoanut.' Few
of the writers of the above had a sufficiently correct idea of the article
to be able to identify it if it were shown them. They react satis-
factorily (to themselves) to the book situation though they would be
laughed at by the gardener and botanist. It is an interesting fact
that in a prominent college for women the word e decemvirate,' which
only readers of Eoman history would be likely to encounter, was cor-
rectly defined by most of the young ladies, while some could give no
definition for gourd, and many others gave such definitions as have been
quoted. This is a striking illustration of the difference between the
word environment of scholastic halls and that of the industries and the
literature of to-day.

The following definitions of gourd are inexplicable until one
realizes that one word form has been mistaken for another. ' To spur

1 64 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

on' (goad). 'To plunge a weapon into some one, to make a jagged
wound' (gored). ' An animal' (goat?). 'A greedy person' (gour-
mand). 'A chasm or piece of land that is very much lower than the
surrounding land ' (gorge).

The definitions thus far quoted are by college students, and though
most of them are exceptional rather than characteristic of the defini-
tions of college students, they are surprising as well as amusing.

One English teacher was so astonished at the ' depth of ignorance '
displayed by the definitions of his freshman class in English that he
had all the papers looked over by his assistants, who all agreed that the
results were ' shocking.' They, however, saw no relation between the
definitions and the scholarship of individual pupils. (As has already
been stated the figures show that those ranking high in scholarship
knew on an average about 5 per cent, more words than those ranking
low in scholarship.)

Character of the definitions changed greatly with age. Descrip-
tions which are so common in the high school and college papers are
rarely or never given by children in the kindergarten and primary
grades. The same is true of definitions by synonyms and inclusions
under larger terms. The younger children nearly always define by
mention of some specific incident, e. g., ' A cliavr is to sit on'; ' Baby
stands up by a chair' ; ' A bee goes around a piazza and makes a noise.'
What anything can do, or what can be done to it, or with it, is of most
importance in early knowledge of all things, hence we find the defini-
tions of children expressing action and use more than anything else.
Eeference to personal experience of self and friends is also common.
These facts are of great significance to pedagogy, strongly endorsing
the change now being made from the old descriptive ' object lesson '
to the better forms of nature study in which use is made the center of
interest.

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE 165

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE IN SOUTH CAROLINA

BY JOHN HAWKINS

AS chemistry began in alchemy and astronomy in astrology, so
medicine, to a great extent, has grown out of magic. Its first
professors were sorcerers and priests ; and its beginnings are to be looked
for in the juggleries and mummeries of holy men and women who, by
fastings, narcotics, or other means, enabled themselves to communicate
with the benignant or malevolent spirits which savage philosophy finds
in every object of nature. Among rude peoples the physician is often
a priest and always a magician.

Alchemy is dead and astrology as it exists to-day is no longer to be
considered seriously by the student of culture; but, owing perhaps to
the religious factor in its origin, the science of medicine, as it is under-
stood by a very large number of persons, is still encumbered with the
dead husks of its earliest growth. Even in the most enlightened coun-
tries physicians are constantly confronted with the idea that disease is
a sort of demoniacal possession which is to be relieved by prayer, or
that it is some mysterious entity which can be removed only by the use
of some equally mysterious remedy. Charms, medals impregnated
with virtue by ecclesiastical benediction, and so-called electric and
galvanic belts, pads, rings, brushes and other appliances are sold by
thousands; and patent panaceas, compounded of drugs brought from
strange lands or discovered in some unusual way, are bought and used
by millions of credulous and afflicted persons in all parts of the world.

In view of these facts it is not remarkable that one occasionally
finds in the United States, as well as in secluded nooks of the Old
World, regions in which superstitious medical practises, handed down
from father to son for no one knows how many hundreds of years, not
only survive, but also show an astonishing degree of vitality.

Such a region occurs in the central part of South Carolina. It is
a strip of country about one hundred miles long and from thirty to fifty
miles wide, lying along the Santee, the Congaree, Broad and Saluda
rivers, and embracing parts of the counties of Orangeburg, Lexington,
Newberry and Saluda. The early European settlers of this region
were Germans who came, about the middle of the eighteenth century,
from the Lower Palatinate, Baden, Wiirtemberg and Switzerland. At
a little later date small groups and isolated families of Scotch-Irish,
of English and of French from the Huguenot settlements of the coast
region established themselves among these peasants from the banks of
the Rhine. But, broadly speaking, this part of Carolina was in the

1 66 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

early days a bit of Germany transplanted bodily into the new world;
and, undisturbed by subsequent immigration, its inhabitants have re-
tained to the present day many of the traits and characteristics of their
ancestors. The existing surnames of the people are still largely Ger-
man; the Lutheran faith is strong; the language of the fatherland has
fallen into disuse almost within the memory of living men; and thi
customs and superstitions which prevail are, to a great extent, those
bequeathed by the pioneers to their descendants.

Until ninety or a hundred years ago, according to local historians,
there were no physicians in this region. Besides the stock of medical
lore in the possession of the old women of every country neighborhood,
the sick had recourse only to a system of practise known as ' using/
which consisted in rubbing the affected part with the hands of the
operator, blowing the breath upon it, and repeating over the patient
certain ancient charms or incantations, in the efficacy of which both
doctor and patient had unbounded faith.

At the present day physicians are here plentiful, and in learning
and skill they compare favorably with those of any country district.
Many of them have enjoyed the advantages of the best schools in
America, and some have studied abroad. Yet here extremes meet,
and the highest and the lowest join hands. The skillful modern physi-
cian, armed with all the resources of science, sometimes finds himself
face to face with a method of medical treatment as old as humanity
itself; and he must pit his pills and powders against magical charms,
some of which bear on their face the marks of a time when Thor an1
Woden were realities and not myths in the minds of men.

It must not be understood that ' using ' is very generally practised.
Its employment is now uncommon and exceptional. As a rule the
Teutonic Carolinians are fairly intelligent, having schools, churches
and newspapers, and superstition is dying out. But a stubborn con-
servatism, seemingly innate in human nature, makes such things die
hard. There is still a class of people which clings tenaciously to the
old beliefs; and this class is apt — especially when regular physicians
fail, as they sometimes must, to relieve the afflicted — to have recourse
to some old man or woman who enjoys a local reputation for skill in
magic. Whether a cure is thus effected or not, belief in the method is
not shaken, for, as Bacon remarks, men count the hits but not the
misses. An occasional success offsets many failures, and so faith in the
formulas which age and the authority of the elders have rendered
sacred remains unimpaired.

As one star differeth from another in glory, so, too, the practitioners
of ' using ' differ from one another in skill and in extent of knowledge.
Some are acquainted with the methods, but have little success in prac-
tise. To some who are successful only one or two of the charms are

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE 167

known; others possess a half dozen or more. Skillful or unskillful,
however, ( users ' are by no means numerous, and when emergencies
arise that demand their services it is sometimes necessary to send to
considerable distances before one is found. Their scarcity is due to
the fact that the formulas are jealously guarded, since the promiscuous
disclosure of the secrets is thought to take away the possessor's influ-
ence over the powers which bring disease and death. The ethics of the
profession demand that when an adept at c using ' feels the approach
of age and death he shall divulge his magical knowledge to some one
(and to one only) who is worthy to possess it; and this one is bound
to transmit it in like manner to a single successor.

It is not altogether impossible, however, as this article will show,
for one of the uninitiated to obtain possession of the formulas. One
may sometimes find a possessor of the mystic charms who is not un-
willing to communicate them to another for a money consideration.
Of those grouped together below, eight were secured in this way. The
remainder, with one exception, were then obtained by a system of ex-
change, charm being given for charm.

So much by way of preface to the formulas themselves, which are
here given in italics, the directions for their use being printed in ordi-
nary type. The authorities are followed verbatim:

Fob Cataract: / rub you with my right thumb, that you may move and
depart. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost.
Amen. Rub it with the thumb from the nose outwards until you say the above
words, blowing first three times. This must be done three mornings and even-
ings, every time three times.

For a Film over the Eye: Eye, I do not knoio what ails you; I know not
whence it is. There shall it go. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the
Holy Ghost. Amen. Hub the eye three times with the right hand and repeat
three times.

For a Blister in the Eye: Joseph begat Anna, Anna begat Mary, Mary
begat our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. This is most certainly true.
Blotch, blister, go away. Do this man's [woman's] eye no harm. In the
name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. Say it three times.

For a Burn or Scald: 0! you hot and burning flame, you are so hot and
dark! With God, the Father, I drive you; with God, the Son, go you away.
In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. Blow the breath
three times upon the burn, pass the hand thrice over it, and say these words
three times.

For a Burn or Scald: The Holy Woman goes out over the land; what
carries she in her hand? A fire-brand. Eat not in you, eat not around you.
In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen. Say these
words three times, rub three times upward and downward, and blow three times
— every time three times.

For Inflammation: St. John came over with all his congregation; St.
Mary came over with all her communication; Christ is mighty to cure mortifi-
cation and all other complaints. In the name of the Father and Son and
Holy Ghost. Amen. Say it three times.

For the Liver-Grown : Liver-grown and Heart-bound depart from thy ribs,
as Jesus went out of the manger. In the name of God, the Father, Son, and
Holy Ghost. Amen. Dip your thumbs in fat and rub three times upon the
breast and three times upon the back as you say the above words, every morning
and evening for three mornings and evenings, three times. This must be done
at odd hours — one, three, five, seven, nine or eleven o'clock.

1 68 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

For the Night-brand or Scrofula: I forewarn you that you shall no
longer burn, but be you cold as a dead man's hand. In the name of the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen. Take the middle finger of your right
hand and rub three times around as you say these words. Do this, morning
and evening, three times, for three mornings and evenings.

For Fever: Jesus went over the mountain, and he saw a great fever and he
cured it with his hands. In the name of God, the Father; in the name of God,
the Son; in the name of God, the Holy Ghost. Amen. Rub three times, blow
three times, and repeat three times.

For Epilepsy, or Falling Sickness: Take a new broom and sweep from
three corners of a room. Throw the sweepings over the person who has the
sickness, while you say these words: In God's name, Falling Sickness, you must
depart till I these seed do cut. So do it three times.

For a Worm in the Finger — Whitlow: As he [she] went over muddy
bagger's branch he [she] met three worms; one was a white one, one was a
black one, and one was a red one. I command this to die, in the name of the
Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Say it three times.

For Stopping Blood: Say the name of the person, then: Holy is the day
and holy is the hour wherein happened the wound. In the name of the Father
and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen. Say the name of him that has
the wound first; and if the wound is on the right side lay your left hand there-
upon, and if on the left side lay your right hand thereupon. If you know the
name of the person you may stop the bleeding though the person be three or
four miles away.

For Colic, or Rising of the Mother: Lay your hand on the person's
stomach and say three times: / stand on wood and I see wood. For one glass-
ful of cold red wine. Rising of Mother, or Colic, let this griping alone. A. B. G.
May God help you. In the name of God, the Father; in the name of God, the
Son; in the name of God, the Holy Ghost. Amen, Amen, and Amen.

For a Boil, or Imposthume : The Boil and the Dragon went over the creek.
The Dragon drank, the Boil sank. In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost. Amen. Lay your right hand upon the boil as you say these words.
Do it three times, and the boil will soon decrease.

For the Wild-fire (Erysipelas) : Wild-fire, move away; the tame-fire is
over you. Take a coal of fire or a fire-brand and rub three times around it
morning and evening, each time three times, as you say these words. It will
soon be better.

For Greedy-worm : When our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, was upon the
earth he met a greedy-worm, and he said, ' Where are you going, greedy-worm?
In the child's stomach or no? You shall not do that. That I forbid you, by
sulphur and pitch, that I may never see you any more. Do you go in the green
wood. There is a well deep and cold. Out of that well you may drink, and
of this child nevermore think.' In the name of the Father, in the name of the
Son, and in the name of the Holy Ghost. Amen, Amen, and Amen. Blow your
breath three times on the face and say these words three times over.

For Open Head: Head, I squeeze you together for [name of patient]. In
the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Press together three times each
way and say these words three times.

A Cure for Bots:

There was a man

Rode over the land

With three worms in his hand.

One loas white, another black, the other red,

And in an hour they xoere dead.

Stand the horse with his bead toward sunrise. Take your right hand and rub
from the nose over the head, neck, and back, down to the end of the tail, as you
say these words. Do this three times in two or three hours, every time three
times. Give some purgative medicine.

There are two more formulas which, though not strictly medical in
character, are so nearly akin to those already given that they may be

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE 169

appropriately included in the same list. One of them is used when the

first collar is placed upon a colt's neck, and it is supposed to prevent

the equine vice known as ' balking,' and to cause the animal to work

satisfactorily. It is as follows :

Refuse not to pull while the Jews keep Saturday for Sunday. In the name
of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

The other is used to prevent the depredations of thieves and burglars
and the approach of deadly enemies. If one has a house or a field
which he wishes to protect he should walk around it three times, re-
peating the incantation each time. It is thought that any one attempt-
ing to cross the line thus made will be paralyzed, in his tracks, and will
have to stand there until released by the sorcerer. This must be done
before sunrise; otherwise the offender may die. The charm is as
follows :

When Mary lay in child-bed and Joseph was about to flee aioay, Joseph
cried out and said: ' There goes a thief in our house who wants to steal the
child.' And Mary said: 'St. Peter bade, St. Peter said, "I have bound him in
God's hand." Whosoever would, in twenty-three hours, steal from me or do
any hurt to my life shall stand there till I tell him to go away.' In the name
of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

About seventy years ago the writer's grandfather removed his family
from South Carolina to the west, and on the eve of his departure a
neighbor gave him this charm for the protection of the wagon-camp
at night, but its virtue was never tested. In South Carolina it seems
still to be used, and there are two or three recent stories of watermelon
thieves having been caught in this way. One relates that at daybreak
the thief was seen standing, unable to move or even to drop the bag
of stolen melons on his shoulder.

There are also formulas for the cure of cancer and for the removal
of warts, but these the writer has not been fortunate enough to secure.
A very old lady of his acquaintance, Mrs. R — , from whom some of the
formulas mentioned were obtained, says that she was cured of cancer
many years ago by one Adam Boland, of Newberry County, who was a
famous ' user ' in his day. In her case the ' using ' was done when
she was not present. She says that Boland, after repeating the charm
and the name of the patient three times, always took an axe and cut
into the heart of a pine tree in order to ascertain whether the treatment
would prove successful. If the tree lived the patient would recover;
otherwise, the charm was powerless. Mrs. R — gives some further
particulars of interest. Her daughter learned a few of the formulas
when a child and used them frequently and successfully to relieve her
father's illness, although he had no faith in the practise. The charms
lose their force if taught by a younger person to an older one; the
learner should always be younger than the teacher. The point of view
from which many persons look on these superstitious methods of treat-
ment is well illustrated by a remark of Mrs. R — . She says :

i7o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

I don't see why ' using ' shouldn't be as efficient as prayer, since the three
highest names [Father, Son, and Holy Ghost] are always used. At any rate
it can do no harm, if it does no good; and in this respect it differs from the
drugs used by physicians.

If we look for practises analogous to these mentioned here the
abundance of material is found to be overwhelming. The use of
charms and incantations for the cure of disease may be noted in all
ages since the dawn of history and among peoples of all grades of cul-
ture. Pepys gives several, current in his day, which are very similar
in character to those given above; for example, the following, for stop-
ping blood:

Sanguis mane in te
Sicut Christus fuit in se;
Sanguis mane in tua vena
Sicut Christus in sua poena;
Sanguis mane fixus
Sicut Christus quando fuit crucifixus.

He also gives one for a burn which is almost identical with one of

those now in use in South Carolina :

There came three angels out of the East;
The one brought fire, the other brought frost.

Out, fire; in, frost.
In the name of the Father, Son, and

Holy Ghost. Amen.

Eeginald Scot in ' The Discoverie of Witchcraft,' published in

1584, records an accredited method:

To heale the King's or Queen's evill, or any other sorenesse of the throte:
Let a virgine, fasting, laie hir hand on the sore and saie: Apollo denieth that
the heate of the plague can increase where a naked virgine quencheth it, and
spet three times upon it.

This is interesting as showing the survival of a formula dating
from pre-Christian times. There is very good reason' for believing
that the incantations of the ' users ' of the present day may claim an
equal antiquity. Like some of the festivals of the church, they had
their origin in heathen times, and the introduction of Christianity did
not suffice to shake their hold on the popular mind. In old Germany
neither Charlemagne's conquest nor the priest who followed it could
put a period to the use of staves carved with mystic runes and devoted
to the purposes of divination and incantation. The oak, the ash and
the willow preserved their sacred character; and in the old heathen
formulas for the cure of disease, the only change effected by Christi-
anity was the substitution of the ' three highest names' (Father, Son
and Holy Ghost) for those of Thor, Woden and other heathen deities.
The following heathen and Christian versions of a popular charm for
sprains will illustrate the change effected :

Old Version.

Phol and Woden
went to the wood;
there was of Balder's colt
his foot wrenched;

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE 171

then Sinthgunt charmed it,
and Sunna her sister;
then Frua charmed it,
and Volla her sister;
then Woden charmed it,
as he well could,
as well the bone-wrench,
as the joint-wrench,
as the blood-wrench;
bone to bone,
blood to blood,
joint to joint,
as if they were glued together.

Christianized Version.

Our Lord rade,

His foal's foot slade;

Down he lighted,

His foal's foot righted;

Bone to bone,

Sinew to sinew,

Flesh to flesh.
Heal, in the name of the Father,
the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Examples of similar formulas might be multiplied indefinitely from
all parts of the world, and from the remotest times to the present, but
this is unnecessary. It is enough to note the curious fact that if the
practise of the Carolina ' users ' of the present day could be witnessed
by Egyptian physicians of four thousand years ago, by Druid priests
from the Gaul described by Csesar, and by American Indian medicine
men from the time of Columbus, it would appear to all of them a per-
fectly natural and philosophical method of treatment, however unin-
telligible the language of the formulas might be.

Besides the superstitions already cited, there exists in this region a
number of other magical healing practises. These, however, unlike
' using/ can not be said to belong exclusively to that part of the popula-
tion which is descended from the early German settlers. Africa is
certainly the native land of some of them. The others form a part of
that vast body of popular lore, of mixed and uncertain origin, which
is the common property of the people of northern and western Europe
and their descendants.

A prescription for rheumatism is closely allied to some of the
' using ' practises, although no words are to be repeated over the patient.
It is compounded of a teacupful of sweet cream, thickened with salt,
seven buds of brier, nine of rosemary and eleven grains of black pepper.
When these have been allowed to simmer together the mixture is to be
skimmed, and with the remaining ointment the rheumatic parts are to
be rubbed ' downward and outward on three Fridays in the dark of the
moon/ Simpler remedies for rheumatism are rattle-snake oil; grease
fried from toads; and a sharp knife or razor taken to bed with the
patient to ' cut the pains.'

i72 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

To cure cramp it is only necessary to wear garters of eel-skin, or
to invert the sufferer's shoes under his bed at night. Herpes, or
shingles, should be rubbed with blood from a black cat's tail or from a
black fowl's neck. Treatment should be prompt, as it is thought that
the patient will certainly die if the inflammation completely encircles
the body.

Negroes seem especially subject to inflammation of the uvula, an
ailment known among them as ' falling palate.' In Orangeburg
County the favorite treatment consists in pressing the uvula upward
with the back of a silver spoon, at the same time pulling strongly at a
tuft of hair on the top of the head. Many negroes cultivate a tuft of
hair, for this purpose, over the middle of the forehead. In another
mode of treatment the uvula is supposed to be driven up into its proper
place by smart blows administered with a stick upon the soles of the feet.

Warts and corns are everywhere the object of many superstitious
practises. In South Carolina the owner of these excrescences may take
his choice of several remedies. He may select a broom straw having
as many joints as there are warts to be removed, pick the warts until
they bleed, and put a drop of blood from each wart upon a joint of the
culm, then bury the straw under the eaves of the house. Or he may
count the warts and tie in a string the same number of knots, and bury
the string. Another method is to rub each wart with a pea, and bury
the peas in the same way. Still another is as follows: Tie as many
knots in a string as there are warts to be removed ; blindfold the patient
and lead him about until he is lost ; then give him the string, which he
should bury in the ground, unobserved by any one. As the string
decays the warts will disappear. Corns may be removed by rubbing
them with a grain of corn and then feeding the grain to the oldest fowl
in the yard. This last remedy comes from a very old negro woman,
still living, who was brought from Africa in her childhood; but this
may not mean that the remedy is African in origin.

An old lady, whose parents were Scotch-Irish, gives the following
remedy for bleeding of the nose : Let the nose bleed on three pieces of
cloth, put these in three holes bored into as many different kinds of
fruit-bearing trees, and stop the holes. This will result in a permanent
cure. A gruesome drink for epilepsy is a tea made of a piece of rope
with which some one has been hanged. Equally repulsive is a reputed
remedy for chills and fever, consisting of pills made of dried and pul-
verized earthworms. Eisings and boils may be cured by the touch of
one who has crushed a ground-mole to death in his hands.

Either from the great number of ailments to which they are sub-
ject or from their helplessness, or possibly from both causes combined,
infants claim a large share of magical medical practise. When a baby
is born an axe is sometimes placed under the mother's couch with the

MAGICAL MEDICAL PRACTISE 173

blade upward to cut the ' after-pains ' of childbirth. To render teeth-
ing easy and painless the infant's gums are rubbed with a ' cooter '
bone, the ear or bone of a rabbit, or the warm brains of the same animal
just killed. It is thought that nine live wood-lice tied in a bag and
suspended from the neck of a child having thrush will soon give relief.
The touch of a posthumous son is recommended for the same complaint.
As a preventive of croup a black silk thread or a string of ' electric '
(amber) beads is placed around the neck.

In the little city of Newberry a few years ago an infant was sup-
posed to have been cured of a disease known as ' stretches ' by passing
it through a horse-collar warm from use. Some authorities say that
shoe-sole tea should first be administered, to be followed by the horse-
collar treatment. In the same county an infant who had a case of
umbilical hernia was passed by his father through a cleft in a living
young white-oak tree. The theory was that the child would recover
if the tree lived ; if it died the hernia would remain. The tree and the
patient, both of them living and whole, are still here to convince un-
believers of the virtues of magical medicine.

The passing of children through rings of various kinds is compara-
tively common. One of the ' using' formulas already given in this
article is for the cure of ' liver-grown/ an ailment known also as
' growed-on ' and ' grow-fast,' in which the liver is supposed to adhere
abnormally to some other organ. This is also treated by passing the
patient through a horse-collar or between the rungs of a ladder. In
still another method the afflicted infant is passed between the legs of
a table, after which it is held by the feet and tossed upwards towards
each of the four corners of the room, care being taken, however, to pre-
vent it from falling or from striking the walls. In Newberry County,
several years ago, a negro mother, misunderstanding the directions
given her by an old woman for this treatment, killed her child by
throwing it forcibly against the four corners of her log house.

It is not always easy to explain the philosophy of superstition, but
in these cases the thought underlying the treatment is sufficiently evi-
dent. The idea seems to be that disease is caused by an evil spirit
which may be misled and puzzled by mazes of rings and tortuous pas-
sages. Thus, interlaced cords are still sold in Italy as charms, and
Persian carpets are woven in intricate patterns to bewilder the evil eye.
Analogies to the Carolina practises cited are abundant and they
lead us back to very remote times. Mr. Edward Clodd, the English
author of several works on custom, myth and religion, is authority for
the statement that the practise of drawing infants through the cleft
trunks of trees (usually ash) still prevails in remote rural districts of
England. Scotch witches in effecting magical cures used to pass their
patients nine times through rings or garlands of woodbine; and from

i74 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Scotland comes also the custom of passing young chicks through the
orbits of a horse's skull to keep the hawks from catching them. The
perforated monoliths of Great Britain and northern Europe are known
generally as ' Odin Stones,' probably because, according to the Norse
mythology, Odin in the shape of a worm bored his head through a
stone to get at the 'mead of poetry'; and babies have been drawn
through them from ancient times to cure them of various ailments.
These monoliths, as well as the small perforated ' Odin ' stones still
used as amulets in the same countries, are closely related to the sala-
grama, or holy stone, common, curiously enough, to Italy and India.
In Italy the salagrama is a stalagmite which is believed, on account
of its resemblance to the mounds thrown up by earthworms, to be such
a mound petrified. The people carry it in a bag with some magical
herbs, and repeat over it an incantation which recites that its cavities
and irregularities are potent to bewilder the evil eye. The Indian
salagrama is a kind of ammonite about as large as an orange and having
a hole through it. A legend relates that Vishnu, the Preserver, when
pursued by the Destroyer, was changed by Maya into the stone, through
which as a worm the Destroyer bored his way. It is believed that the
evil eye is blunted by the perforation and by the irregularities of the
stone's surface.

The survival in the midst of a high civilization of these Carolina
practises, allied as they are to practises and beliefs of almost primitive
times, affords a pertinent illustration of the manner in which magical
arts cling to life. We have seen how heathen charms and incantations
not only failed to disappear before the coming of Christianity, but even
gained a new lease of life by hastening to enlist themselves under its
banner. It is the same way with superstitions in general. Adapting
themselves from age to age to the changed conditions which surround
them, here receding and there advancing, dying out only to reappear
under changed and scarcely recognizable forms, they yield almost im-
perceptibly to the advance of sound learning and common sense. Their
retreat, however, has been more rapid since science has begun to shed
her rays into the dark places where such things hide themselves; and
in proportion as this great light becomes more generally diffused magic
in medicine, as in all other departments of human thought, will fade
and finally disappear.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 175

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

By m. h. poincare

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

Chapter V. Analysis and Physics

~V7~ 0 IT have doubtless often been asked of what good are mathematics
-"- and whether these delicate constructions entirely mind-made
are not artificial and born of our caprice.

Among those who put this question I should make a distinction;
practical people ask of us only the means of money-making. These
merit no reply; rather would it be proper to ask of them what is the
good of accumulating so much wealth and whether, to get time to
acquire it, art and science are to be neglected, which alone should
make us capable of enjoying it, ' and for life's sake to sacrifice all reasons
for living/

Besides, a science made solely in view of applications is impossible ;
truths are fecund only if bound together. If we devote ourselves solely
to those truths whence we expect an immediate result, the intermediary
links are wanting and there will no longer be a chain.

The men most disdainful of theory get from it, without suspecting
it, their daily bread; deprived of this food, progress would quickly
cease, and we should soon congeal into the immobility of China.

But enough of uncompromising practicians ! Besides these, there
are those who are only interested in nature and who ask us if we can
enable them to know it better.

To answer these, we have only to show them the two monuments
already rough-hewn, Celestial Mechanics and Mathematical Physics.

They would doubtless concede that these structures are well worth
the trouble they have cost us. But this is not enough. Mathematics
have a triple aim. They must furnish an instrument for the study of
nature. But that is not all : they have a philosophic aim and, I dare
maintain, an esthetic aim. They must aid the philosopher to fathom
the notions of number, of space, of time. And above all their adepts
find therein delights analogous to those given by painting and music.
They admire the delicate harmony of numbers and forms ; they marvel
when a new discovery opens to them an unexpected perspective; and
has not the joy they thus feel the esthetic character, even though the
senses take no part therein? Only a privileged few are called to enjoy
it fully, it is true, but is not this the case for all the noblest arts ?

176 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

This is why I do not hesitate to say that mathematics deserve to be
cultivated for their own sake, and that the theories inapplicable to
physics should be so as well as the others. Even if the physical aim and
the esthetic aim were not united, we ought not to sacrifice either.

But more: these two aims are inseparable and the best means of
attaining one is to aim at the other, or at least never to lose sight of it.
This is what I am about to try to demonstrate in setting forth the
nature of the relations between the pure science and its applications.

The mathematician should not be for the physicist a mere pur-
veyor of formulas; there should be between them a more intimate
collaboration. Mathematical physics and pure analysis are not merely
adjacent powers, maintaining good neighborly relations ; they mutually
interpenetrate and their spirit is the same. This will be better under-
stood when I have shown what physics gets from mathematics and
what mathematics, in return, borrows from physics.

The physicist can not ask of the analyst to reveal to him a new
truth; the latter could at most only aid him to foresee it. It is a
long time since one still dreamt of forestalling experiment, or of con-
structing the entire world on certain premature hypotheses. Since all
those constructions in which one yet took a naive delight it is an age,
to-day only their ruins remain.

All laws are therefore deduced from experiment; but to enunciate
them, a special language is needful; ordinary language is too poor, it
is besides too vague, to express relations so delicate, so rich, and so
precise.

This therefore is one reason why the physicist can not do without
mathematics; it furnishes him the only language he can speak. And
a well-made language is no indifferent thing ; not to go beyond physics,
the unknown man who invented the word heat devoted many genera-
tions to error. Heat has been treated as a substance, simply because it
was designated by a substantive, and it has been thought indestructible.

On the other hand, he who invented the word electricity had the
unmerited good fortune to implicitly endow physics with a new law,
that of the conservation of electricity, which, by a pure chance, has been
found exact, at least until now.

Well, to continue the simile, the writers who embellish a language,
who treat it as an object of art, make of it at the same time a more
supple instrument, more apt for rendering shades of thought.

We understand, then, how the analyst, who pursues a purely esthetic
aim, helps create, just by that, a language more fit to satisfy the
physicist.

But this is not all : law springs from experiment, but not immedi-

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 177

ately. Experiment is individual, the law deduced from it is general;
experiment is only approximate, the law is precise, or at least pretends
to be. Experiment is made under conditions always complex, the
enunciation of the law eliminates these complications. This is what is
called ' correcting the systematic errors.'

In a word, to get the law from experiment, it is necessary to
generalize; this is a necessity imposed upon the most circumspect ob-
server. But how generalize? Every particular truth may evidently
be extended in an infinity of ways. Among these thousand routes
opening before us, it is necessary to make a choice, at least provisional;
in this choice, what shall guide us ?

It can only be analogy. But how vague is this word ! Primitive
man knew only crude analogies, those which strike the senses, those of
colors or of sounds. He never would have dreamt of likening light to
radiant heat.

What has taught us to know the true, profound analogies, those the
eyes do not see but reason divines?

It is the mathematical spirit, which disdains matter to cling only
to pure form. This it is which has taught us to give the same name
to things differing only in material, to call by the same name, for
instance, the multiplication of quaternions and that of whole numbers.

If quaternions, of which I have just spoken, had not been so
promptly utilized by the English physicists, many persons would doubt-
less see in them only a useless fancy, and yet, in teaching us to liken
what appearances separate, they would have already rendered us more
apt to penetrate the secrets of nature.

Such are the services the physicist should expect of analysis :, but for
this science to be able to render them, it must be cultivated in the
broadest fashion without immediate expectation of utility — the mathe-
matician must have worked as artist.

What we ask of him is to help us to see, to discern our way in the
labyrinth which opens before us. Now, he sees best who stands highest.
Examples abound, and1 1 limit myself to the most striking.

The first will show us how to change the language suffices to reveal
generalizations not before suspected.

When Newton's law has been substituted for Kepler's, we still know
only elliptic motion. Now, in so far as concerns this motion, the two
laws differ only in form; we pass from one to the other by a simple
differentiation. And yet from Newton's law may be deduced by an
immediate generalization all the effects of perturbations and the whole
of celestial mechanics. If, on the other hand, Kepler's enunciation
had been retained, no one would ever have regarded the orbits of the
perturbed plants, those complicated curves of which no one has ever
written the equation, as the natural generalizations of the ellipse. The

V>L, LXX. — 12.

178 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

progress of observations would only have served to create belief in
chaos.

The second example is equally deserving of consideration.

When Maxwell began his work, the laws of electro-dynamics ad-
mitted up to his time accounted for all the known facts. It was
not a new experiment which came to invalidate them. But in looking
at them under a new bias, Maxwell saw that the equations became
more symmetrical when a term was added, and besides, this term was
too small to produce effects appreciable with the old methods.

You know that Maxwell's a priori views awaited for twenty years
an experimental confirmation; or if you prefer, Maxwell was twenty
years ahead of experiment. How was this triumph obtained?

It was because Maxwell was profoundly steeped in the sense of
mathematical symmetry; would he have been so, if others before him
had not studied this symmetry for its own beauty ?

It was because Maxwell was accustomed to ' think in vectors,' and
yet it was through the theory of imaginaries (neomonics) that vectors
were introduced into analysis. And those who invented imaginaries
hardly suspected the advantage which would be obtained from them
for the study of the real world; of this the name given them is proof
sufficient.

In a word, Maxwell was perhaps not an able analyst, but this
ability would have been for him only a useless and bothersome baggage.
On the other hand, he had in the highest degree the intimate sense
of mathematical analogies. Therefore it is that he made good mathe-
matical physics.

Maxwell's example teaches us still another thing.

How should the equations of mathematical physics be treated?
Should we simply deduce all the consequences, and regard them as
intangible realities? Far from it; what they should teach us above
all is what can and what should be changed. It is thus that we get
from them something useful.

The third example goes to show us how we may perceive mathe-
matical analogies between phenomena which have physically no rela-
tion either apparent or real, so that the laws of one of these phenomena
aid us to divine those of the otber.

The very same equation, that of Laplace, is met in the theory of
Newtonian attraction, in that of the motion of liquids, in that of the
electric potential, in that of magnetism, in that of the propagation of
heat and in still many others. What is the result? These theories
seem images copied one from the other; they are mutually illuminating,
borrowing their language from each other; ask electricians if they do
not felicitate themselves on having invented the phrase flow of force,
suggested by hydrodynamics and the theory of heat.

THE VALVE OF SCIENCE 179

Thus mathematical analogies not only , may make us foresee phys-
ical analogies, but besides do not cease to be useful when these latter
fail.

To sum up, the aim of mathematical physics is not only to facilitate
for the physicist the numerical calculation of certain constants or the
integration of certain differential equations. It is besides, it is above
all, to reveal to him the hidden harmony of things in making him see
them in a new way.

Of all the parts of analysis, the most elevated, the purest, so to
speak, will be 'the most fruitful in the hands of those who know how
to use them.

Ill

Let us now see what analysis owes to physics.

It would be necessary to have completely forgotten the history of
science not to remember that the desire to understand nature has had
on the development of mathematics the most constant and happiest
influence.

In the first place the physicist sets us problems whose solution he
expects of us. But in proposing them to us, he has largely paid us in
advance for the service we shall render him, if we solve them.

If I may be allowed to continue my comparison with the fine arts,
the pure mathematician who should forget the existence of the exterior
world would be like a painter who knew how to harmoniously combine
colors and forms, but who lacked models. His creative power would
soon be exhausted.

The combi nations which numbers and symbols may form' are an
infinite multitude. In this multitude how shall we choose those which
are worthy to fix our attention? Shall we let ourselves be guided solely
by our caprice? This caprice, which itself would besides soon tire,
would doubtless carry us very far apart and we should quickly cease
to understand each other.

But this is only the smaller side of the question. Physics will doubt-
less prevent our straying, but it will also preserve us from a danger
much more formidable; it will prevent our ceaselessly going around in
the same circle.

History proves that physics has not only forced us to choose among
problems which came in a crowd ; it has imposed upon us such as we
should without it never have dreamed of. However varied may be the
imagination of man. nature is still a thousand times richer. To follow
her we must take ways we have neglected, and these paths lead us often
to summits whence we discover new countries. What could be more
useful !

It is with mathematical symbols as with physical realities; it is in
comparing the different aspects of things that we are able to compre-

180 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

hend their inner harmony;, which alone is beautiful and consequently
worthy of our efforts.

The first examine I shall cite is so old we are tempted to forget
it; it is nevertheless the most important of all.

The sole natural object of mathematical thought is the whole
number. It is the external world which has imposed the continuum
upon us, which we doubtless have invented, but which it has forced us
to invent. Without it there would be no infinitesimal analysis; all
mathematical science would reduce itself to arithmetic or to the theory
of substitutions.

On the contrary, we have devoted to the study of the continuum
almost all our time and all our strength. Who will regret it; who will
think that this time and this strength have been wasted? Analysis
unfolds before us infinite perspectives that arithmetic never suspects;
it shows us at a glance a majestic assemblage whose array is simple
and symmetric ; on the contrary, in the theory of numbers, where reigns
the unforeseen, the view is, so to speak, arrested at every step.

Doubtless it will be said that outside of the whole number there is
no rigor, and consequently no mathematical truth; that the whole
number hides everywhere, and that we must strive to render trans-
parent the screens which cloak it, even if to do so we must resign our-
selves to interminable repetitions. Let us not be such purists and
let us be grateful to the continuum, which, if all springs from the
whole number, was alone capable of making so much proceed therefrom.

Need I also recall that M. Hermite obtained a surprising advantage
from the introduction of continuous variables into the theory of num-
bers ? Thus the whole number's own domain is itself invaded, and this
invasion has established order where disorder reigned.

See what we owe to the continuum and consequently to physical
nature.

Fourier's series is a precious instrument of which analysis makes
continual use, it is by this means that it has been able to represent
discontinuous functions; Fourier invented it to solve a problem of
physics relative to the propagation of heat. If this problem had not
come up naturally, we should never have dared to give discontinuity
its rights; we should still long have regarded continuous functions as
the only true functions.

The notion of function has been thereby considerably extended and
has received from some logician-analysts an unforeseen development.
These analysts have thus adventured into regions where reigns the
purest abstraction and have gone as far away as possible from the real
world. Yet it is a problem of physics which has furnished them the
occasion.

After Fourier's series, other analogous series have entered the do-

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 181

main of analysis; they have entered by the same door; they have been
imagined in view of applications.

The theory of partial differential equations of the second order has
an analogous history. It has been developed chiefly by and for physics.
But it may take many forms, because such an equation does not suffice
to determine the unknown function, it is necessary to adjoin to it
complementary conditions which are called conditions at the limits;
whence many different problems.

If the analysts had abandoned themselves to their natural tenden-
cies, they would never have known but one, that which Madame
Kovalevski has treated in her celebrated memoir. But there are a
multitude of others which they would have ignored. Each of the
theories of physics, that of electricity, that of heat, presents us these
equations under a new aspect. It may therefore be said that without
these theories we should not know partial differential equations.

It is needless to multiply examples. I have given enough to be able
to conclude : when physicists ask of us the solution of a problem,
it is not a duty-service they impose upon us, it is on the contrary we who
owe them thanks.

But this is not all ; physics not only gives us the occasion to solve
problems; it aids us to find the means thereto, and that in two ways.
It makes us foresee the solution ; it suggests arguments to us.

I have spoken above of Laplace's equation which is met in a multi-
tude of diverse physical theories. It is found again in geometry, in
the theory of conformal representation and in pure analysis, in that
of imaginaries.

In this way, in the study of functions of complex variables, the
analyst, alongside of the geometric image, which is his usual instru-
ment, finds many physical images which he may make use of with the
same success. Thanks to these images he can see at a glance what pure
deduction would show him only successively. He masses thus the
separate elements of the solution, and by a sort of intuition divines
before being able to demonstrate.

To divine before demonstrating ! Need I recall that thus have been
made all the important discoveries? How many are the truths that
physical analogies permit us to present and that we are not in con-
dition to establish by rigorous reasoning!

For example, mathematical physics introduces a great number of
developments in series. No one doubts that these developments con-
verge; but the mathematical certitude is lacking. These are so many
conquests assured for the investigators who shall come after us.

On the other hand, physics furnishes us not alone solutions; it
furnishes us besides, in a certain measure, arguments. It will suffice

i82 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

to recall how Felix Klein, in a question relative to Riemann surfaces, .
has had recourse to the properties of electric currents.

It is true, the arguments of this species are not rigorous, in the
sense the analyst attaches to this word. x\nd here a question arises :
How can a demonstration not sufficiently rigorous for the analyst
suffice for the physicist ? It seems there can not be two rigors, that
rigor is or is not, and that, where it is not there can not be deduction.

This apparent paradox will be better understood by recalling under
what conditions number is applied to natural phenomena. Whence
come in general the difficulties encountered in seeking rigor? We
strike them almost always in seeking to establish that some quantity
tends to some limit, or that some function is continuous, or that it
has a derivative.

Now the numbers the physicist measures by experiment are never
known except approximately; and besides, any function always differs
as little as you choose from a discontinuous function, and at the same
time it differs as little as you choose from a continuous function. The
physicist may, therefore, at will suppose that the function studied is
continuous, or that it is discontinuous; that it has or has not a deriva-
tive; and may do so without fear of ever being contradicted, either by
present experience or by any future experiment. We see that with
such liberty he makes sport of difficulties which stop the analyst. He
may always reason as if all the functions which occur in his calculations
were entire polynomials.

Thus the sketch which suffices for physics is not the deduction which
analysis requires. It does not follow thence that one can not aid in
finding the other. So many physical sketches have already been trans-
formed into rigorous demonstrations that to-day this transformation
is easy. There would be plenty of examples did I not fear in citing
them to tire the reader.

I hope I have said enough to show that pure analysis and mathe-
matical physics may serve one another without making any sacrifice
one to the other, and that each of these two sciences should rejoice in
all which elevates its associate.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIEACE

183

THE PKOGKESS OF SCIENCE

THE CONVOCATION WEEK
MEETINGS
The meetings of the American As-
sociation for the Advancement, of Sci-
ence and of the twenty-one national
scientific societies affiliated with it, held
in New York City from December 26
to January 2, exhibited convincingly
the great progress that has taken place
in this country in scientific research
and in scientific organization. Twenty
years ago Brown Goode, who was better
informed than any other in regard to
the history of science ,in America, esti-
mated that our scientific men num-
bered about five hundred. There were
about 2.500 scientific men at the New
York meeting and about 800 scientific
papers were presented before the sec-
tions of the association and the special
societies. The growth of our scientific
institutions and ' the increase in the
number of our scientific men appear to

be in a geometric ratio. There are now
at least 5,000 scientific men in the
United States, and it is by no means
impossible that twenty years hence the
number will be 50,000. And this is
but as it should be. There are 100,-
000 physicians and 500,000 teachers in
the country, and one half of the physi-
cians and one tenth of the teachers
might to advantage engage in scientific
research. The nation can certainly
afford to devote one tenth of its re-
sources and one tenth of its people to
ideal ends, and in the case of science
the conditions are favorable also on the
economic side, for the more we give to
science the- more we receive from it.

It seems almost impossible to select
from the hundreds of scientific ad-
dresses, papers and discussions any for
special mention. Some people are dis-
appointed because no great discovery is
announced at such a meeting. As a

Edward Kasxer, Professor of Mathematics Clifford Richardson, Director of the New
in Columbia University, Vice-president for the York Testing Laboratories, Vice-president for
Section of Mathematics and Astronomy. the Section of Chemistry.

TEE VALUE OF SCIENCE

185

Alfred C. Lane, State Geologist of Michi-
gan, Vice-president for the Section of Geology
and Geography.

matter of fact, the great discoveries in I
the history of science are but few, and
it is as a rule only in retrospect that
they are seen in their true perspective.
The doctrine of the origin of species by
natural selection is probably one of
the two great scientific advances of the
past century, and it was clearly and
dramatically announced at a certain
meeting of the Linnean Society. Yet
no one would expect the newspapers
the next morning to devote their front
pages to a report of the meeting. The
work of the scientific men of the coun-
try during the year was more im-
portant for the people than the pro-
ceedings of its congress and legisla-
tures, and this work was in large
measure reported at the New York
meeting. Almost any one of the re-
searches presented might be the subject
of an interesting article; abstracts of
all of them, so brief as to be unin-
telligible, would fill a volume of the
Monthly.

The first article of the constitution

of the American Association reads as
follows: "The objects of the Associa-
tion are, by periodical and migratory
meetings, to promote intercourse be-
tween those who are cultivating science
in different parts of America, to give a
stronger and more general impulse and
more systematic direction to scientific
research, and to procure for the labors
of scientific men increased facilities and
a wider usefulness." Certainly a meet-
ing such as that of the present year
does much to advance these objects.
The council of the association, to which
the affiliated societies now elect dele-
gates, is a body truly representative of
scientific research and of scientific men.
Its functions in the future will prob-
ably become more important than
hitherto, for it is not only able to con-
duct the business of the association,
but to exert a predominant influence on
the conditions which affect scientific
progress.

The retiring president of the Asso-
ciation, Professor Calvin M. Woodward,
known both as an engineer and for his

Edwin G. Conki.in, Professor of Zoology in
the University of Pennsylvania, Vice-president
for the Section of Zoology.

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Til E FROGRESS OF SCIENCE

187

\V. R. Warner, Presidentof theWarnerand
Swasey Company, Vice-president of the Sec-
tion for Mechanical Science and Engineering.

leadership in introducing manual train-
ing in the schools, chose as the sub-
ject of his address ' The Science of
Education,' and one of the most im-
portant transactions of the association
was the establishment of a section of
education. A similar section of the
British Association, established several

years ago, has proved to be of much
value, and there is reason to believe
that this section, which begins au-
spiciously with Dr. Elmer E. Brown,
U. S. commissioner of education, as
chairman, will accomplish much for
tlie advancement of education as a sci-
ence, for the teaching of science in the
schools and colleges and for the im-
provement of educational administra-
tion in our schools, colleges and uni-
versities.

The section last established was one
for physiology and experimental medi-
cine, which at the present meeting

Charles A. Conant, Treasurer of the Mor-
ton Trust Company, Vice president for the
Section for Social and Economic Science.

Simon Flexner, Director of the Laborato-
lies of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical
Research, Vice-president for the Section of
Physiology and Experimental Medicine.

cooperated with the national societies
devoted to physiology, anatomy, bac-
teriology and psychology, and held a
special session for the discussion of
' Protozoa as Factors in the Diseases
of Animals and Plants.' It is also
noteworthy that for the first time, at
least in recent years, a representa-
tive of the medical sciences was presi-
dent of the association, thus giving
recognition to the fact that medicine

i88

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

has now taken its place among the
sciences. To this result perhaps no
one in this country has contributed so
much as Dr. W. H. Welch, of the
Johns Hopkins University, who pre-
sided over the New York meeting. He
is succeeded in the presidency by Dr.
E. L. Nichols, of Cornell University,
who is eminent for his contributions
to experimental physics and has at the
same time exerted a great influence on
educational development and scien-
tific organization. The standard set
by the presidency of the association
is well maintained by the vice-presi-
dents for the sections, who are as fol-
lows : Mathematics and Astronomy.
Professor E. 0. Lovett, Princeton Uni-
versity; Physics, Professor Dayton C.
Miller, Case School of Applied Science;
Chemistry, Professor H. P. Talbot,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology;
Mechanical Science and Engineering,
Professor Olin H. Landreth, Union Col-
lege; Geology and Geography, Pro-
fessor J. P. Iddings, University of
Chicago; Zoology, Professor E. B. Wil-
son, Columbia University; Botany,
Professor C. E. Bessey, University of
Nebraska ; Anthropology, Professor
Franz Boas, Columbia University; Eco-
nomics and Social Science, Dr. John
Franklin Crowell, New York City;
Physiology and Experimental Medi-
cine, Dr. Ludvig Hektoen, University
of Chicago; Education, Dr. Elmer E.
Brown, U. S. Commissioner of Edu-
cation. The meeting next year will be
held at Chicago, where, as through-
out Illinois and the adjacent states,
science has in recent years begun to
rival the earlier development on the
Atlantic seaboard.

THE CARNEGIE FOUNDATION FOR
THE ADVANCEMENT OF
TEACHING
The first report of the president to
the trustees of the Carnegie Founda-
tion gives Mr. Carnegie's original
letter, the certificate of incorporation
in New York, the act of incorporation
by the congress, the by-laws of the

corporation, the report of the treas-
urer, and the rules for granting re-
tiring allowances, as well as an ac-
count of what has been accomplished
and a discussion of policy by Presi-
dent Pritchett. As has already been
announced, the pensions are of two
kinds, one given at or after the age
of sixty-five to men who have been
professors for fifteen years, and one
given after twenty-five years of serv-
ice. The pensions are relatively larger
for those having small salaries, be-
ing arranged on a sliding scale of
from nine tenths to one half the salary.
The foundation may give a pension to
the widow of a professor entitled to
a retiring allowance, and has given
pensions to disabled professors, though
there is no clear provision covering
the latter case.

There are certain accepted institu-
tions, at present fifty-two in number,
whose professors receive the pensions
automatically on application from the
institution, and the foundation may
award pensions to professors of other
institutions. On October 1, there had
been awarded forty-five allowances to
professors in accepted institutions,
thirty-five allowances to individual
professors and eight allowances to
widows. The average allowance to the
first class is $1,552; to the second
$1,302, and to the third $833. De-
nominational institutions are excluded
by the act of incorporation; the in-
clusion of institutions supported by
the state is under advisement.

The report gives the accompanying
summary of the salaries of the pro-
fessors in American colleges. There
is also included a history of the
pensions of professors and a dis-
cussion of standards of admission to
universities and colleges.

Mr. Carnegie's great benefaction
will aid our universities, colleges and
technical schools, and will thus of
course be welcomed by their professors.
Whether it will, as President Butler
of Columbia University says in his
annual report, ' lift one of the heaviest

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

189

•

Class of Institutions.

No. of
Institu-
tions.

218
58
51

Total
No. Pro-
fessors.

Total Amount
Salaries.

Average

No. in

Faculty.

Average
Pay-roll in
Institution.

$15,165
45,120
72,710

Average
Pay of a
Professor.

Denominational

Non-Denominational .

2,802
1,461

1,944

$3,305,930
2,617,210
3,708,220

13
25
38

$1,180
1,787
1,907

327

6,207

$9,631,360

burdens that they have had to bear '
' from the shoulders of hundreds of
hard-working and ill-compensated men '
is more problematical. These hard-
working and ill-compensated professors
are not so badly off after all, and if
their salaries have not increased in
proportion to the greater cost and
higher standards of living, they should
themselves see to it that justice is
done. Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Cor-
nell and other universities already had
pension systems as a matter of con-
tract with their professors, and if it is
intended that Mr. Carnegie's founda-
tion shall be of benefit to the pro-
fessors, their salaries should be in-
creased by the amount of income set
free. It is quite possible that pro-
fessors will in the end be paid just
so much the less, because pensions have
been assured to them. The individual
professor would probably have gained
more and certain institutions would
have gained less if the trustees had
been professors instead of presidents.

President Pritchett says in his re-
port : " It is evident to the trustees
that, to better the profession of the
teacher and to attract into it increas-
ing numbers of strong men, it is neces-
sary that the retiring allowance should
come as a matter of right, not as a
charity. No ambitious and inde-
pendent professor wishes to find him-
self in the position of accepting a
charity or a favor, and the retiring
allowance system simply as a charity
has little to commend it." But un-
fortunately the pensions of widows and
for disablement are at present on a
charity basis. They should either be
abandoned, or made so that they will
accrue as a matter of contract. In

the German universities a professor re-
ceives his salary for life. He may
cease lecturing if disabled by illness
or old age, but he may continue to
lecture as long as he sees fit to such
students as care to hear him. In case
of death a pension is provided for his
widow and for each child. This is
more satisfactory than the system pro-
posed by the Carnegie Foundation.
However, it might not be possible to
adjust it to the American college.
Certainly all professors and all scien-
tific men should be sincerely grateful
to Mr. Carnegie. But it is a mis-
fortune that he did not make pro-
fessors trustees of the Carnegie Foun-
dation and scientific men trustees of
the Carnegie Institution.

THE SAND-DUNES OF THE
DESERT OF ISLAY

I It is a familiar fact that sand-dunes
are carried along by the winds. Much
labor and expense have been incurred
in many localities, especially near the

! sea, to prevent the damage which their
movement inflicts on the neighboring
country. These sand-hills are found in
great numbers in nearly all the desert
regions of the earth, and their forms
and motions have been described by
different writers. A recent volume of
the Annals of the Harvard Observa-
tory contains a somewhat elaborate
discussion of the crescent-shaped sand-
dunes of tbe Desert of Islay in Peru,
by Professor S. I. Bailey, who observed
tli em during eight years.

The coast region of Peru is desert
throughout its whole extent. In some
places it is made up of barren hills,
in others, of arid plains. The Pampa,
or Desert of Islay, is bounded by the

190

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Andes, the Pacific, and the rivers Vitor
and Tambo. Its length and breadth
are about equal, perhaps fifty miles
in extent. The mean elevation of the
pampa is about four thousand feet,
increasing toward the north. It is a
great plain with occasional low hills,
almost devoid of animal and vegetable
life, except among the low hills facing
the sea. It appears to have been
formerly the bed of the ocean. The
surface is composed of sand, sprinkled

the wind, and the cusps lie in the
direction of motion. Their size varies
between rather wide limits. They are
in general from one hundred to two
hundred feet broad, and from ten to
twenty feet high. They are composed
entirely of a fine gray sand, and are
moved along by the wind so perfectly
that not only is the crescent form pre-
served, but none of the sand is left
behind to mark the passage. A casual
glance at the surface of the pampa

A Sand-dune on the Pe?ert of Islav.

over with stones and small boulders,
and ail occasional outcrop of rock.
Scattered over the pampa, especially
in its northern portion, are hundreds
of crescent-shaped sand-dunes. Their
form is always the same, approxi-
mately that of the new moon, unless
some unusual object is encountered by
the dunes in their journey across the
desert. Their motion seems to be
always toward the north or northwest,
in the same direction as that of the
prevailing south and southeast wind.
The convex surface is directed toward

detects little if any of the sand which
enters into the composition of the
1 dunes. The same variety of sand is
found, however, by digging beneath the
surface. It appears that all the avail-
able surface sand has already been
collected by the wind into these sym-
metrical heaps, and that, unless the
surface is disturbed by some convul-
sion of nature, the dunes may all
finally disappear among the hills on
the north of the desert. This theory
seems to be confirmed by the abun-
dance of dunes in the northern part of

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

191

the desert, and their ahsence from the
southern part. The motion is always
to the north but varies somewhat with
the season and the strength of the
wind. Tables and curves are given in
the discussion, showing the relations
between the rate of motion and the
wind. Only the comparatively strong
winds are able to move the sand.
During the year 1900 the wind was
recorded stronger than ten miles per
hour 1,477 times, of which the wind
was southerly 1,414 times, and in all
other directions only 63 times. The
strongest winds are always southerly,
reaching at times 20 miles per hour.
Northerly winds are not strong and
persistent enough to break up the
symmetrical form of the dunes. The
following brief table gives the mean
monthlv motion of the dunes:

Month.

Movement.

Feet per

Month.

Movement.

Inches per

Dav.

January...
February ..

March

April

May

June

July

August ....
September
October....
November
December

5.6
7.1
6.0
3.4
2.7
3.2
3.0
3.<9
5.9
6.6
80
5.9

2.2
3.0
2.3
1.3
1.1
1.3
1.2
1.5
2.4
2.5
3.2
2.3

The crescent shape is well preserved
as the dune advances, except where the
force or direction of the wind is affected
by some adjacent object. The sand-
dunes are formed in different parts of
the desert, and move across it till they
reach the hills on the northern border.
These low hills are the burial places
of the dunes. As individuals they go
to pieces as soon as they touch these
irregular formations, and become
merely confused heaps of sand. As-
suming the average journey, which
they travel, to be twenty-five miles,
since the mean yearly motion is about
sixty-one feet, the life of a sand-dune
may be estimated at more than 2,000

years. Since the desert is somewhat
broken in places by ravines- and low
hills, it is probable that but few of
them make the full journey without at
some time losing their identity.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS
The national scientific societies
which met in New York City dur-
ing convocation week elected presiding
officers as follows: The American So-
ciety of Naturalists, Professor J. Play-
fair McMurrich, University of Michi-
gan; The Astronomical and Astrophys-
ical Society of America, Professor E.
0. Pickering, Harvard College Obser-
vatory; The American Mathematical
Society, Professor H. S. White, Vassar
College; The American Physical So-
ciety, Professor E. L. Nichols, Cornell
University; The American Chemical
Society, Professor T. Marston Bogert,
Columbia University; The Association
of American Geographers, Professor
Angelo Heilprin, Yale University; The
American Physiological Society, Pro-
fessor W. H. Howell, The Johns Hop-
kins University; The Society of Verte-
brate Paleontologists, Professor Bash-
ford Dean, Columbia University, The
American Entomological Society, Pro-
fessor J. H. Comstock, Cornell Uni-
versity; The American Botanical So-
ciety, Professor George F. Atkinson,
Cornell University; The American
Psychological Association, Dr. Henry
Rutgers Marshall. New Yoi'k City;
The American Philosophical Associa-
tion, Professor H. N. Gardiner, Smith
College; The American Anthropological
Society, Professor Franz Boas, Colum-
bia University.

Dr. William H. Welch, Dr. Henry
S. Pritchett and the Hon. William H.
Taft have been elected trustees of the
Carnegie Institution.

The Brazilian government proposes
to establish a national geological sur-
vey under the direction of Dr. O. A.
Derby, who was for many years geolo-
gist of the state of S. Paulo. Dr.
Derby went to Brazil in 1875, as a

192

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

member of the extinct commissao geo-
logica, of which Professor C. F. Hartt
was the chief. He has lived in Brazil
ever since, and is the leading authority
on Brazilian geology. — Professor J. A.
Bownocker, of the State University,
has been appointed state geologist of
Ohio to succeed Professor Edward
Orton, Jr., resigned. — The lords com-
missioners of the admirality have ap-
pointed Syndey S. Hough, Esq., F.R.S.,
chief assistant to the astronomer at
the observatory, Cape of Good Hope, to
be astronomer at that observatory on
the retirement of Sir David Gill,
K.C.B.

Dr. William A. Noyes, head of the
department of chemistry in the Bu-
reau of Standards, and secretary and
editor of the American Chemical So-
ciety, has been elected professor of
chemistry in the University of Illinois.
■ — -Professor Ernest Rutherford, Mac-
donald professor of physics in McGill
University, has been appointed to suc-
ceed Professor Schuster as Langworthy
professor and director of the physical
laboratories at the University of Man-

chester.— Dr. William Duane, professor
of physics in the University of Colo-
rado, at Boulder, has resigned to accept
a position in the Curie Radium Labo-
ratory at Paris. The fund providing
for Dr. Duane's work is the gift of Mr.
Andrew Carnegie.

At the annual banquet of the Na-
tional Geographic Society the first
award of its gold medal was made to
Commander Peary. — Professor T. W.
Richards has been elected an honorary
member of the Royal Institution of
Great Britain. — Mr. Alexander Agassiz
has chartered the steam yacht Virginia
for a cruise to the West Indies. The
yacht will sail from New York the first
week in February to be absent for
three months.

Mr. John D. Rockefeller has given
the University of Chicago $2,700,000
for its permanent endowment, and
$217,000 for current expenses and spe-
cial purposes. It is further reported
that Mr. Rockefeller will give $3,000,-
000 for a pension at the University
of Chicago, and $2,000,000 for the pro-
posed Louisville University.

THE
POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

MARCH, 1907

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM1
I. Its Mediating Office

By Professor WILLIAM JAMES
Harvard University

["N the preface to that admirable collection of essays of his called
-*- Heretics, Mr. Chesterton writes these words:

There are some people — and I am one of them — who think that the most
practical and important thing about a man is still his view of the universe. We
think that for a landlady considering a lodger, it is important to know his in-
come, but still more important to know his philosophy. We think that for a
general about to fight an enemy, it is important to know the enemy's numbers,
but still more important to know the enemy's philosophy. We think the question
is not whether the theory of the cosmos affects matters, but whether in the long
run anything else affects them.2

I think with Mr. Chesterton in this matter. I know that you,
ladies and gentlemen, have a philosophy, each and all of you, and
that the most interesting and important thing about you is the way
in which it determines the perspective in your several worlds. You
know the same of me. And yet I confess to a certain tremor at the
audacity of the enterprise which I am about to begin. For the
philosophy which is so important in each of us is not a technical
matter, it is our more or less dumb smse of what life honestly and
deeply means. It is only partly got from books; it is our individual
way of just seeing and feeling the total push and pressure of the cosmos.

1 The first of a course of eight lectures on ' Pragmatism : A new name for
an old way of thinking,' given before the Lowell Institute, Boston, and the
Departments of Philosophy and Psychology, Columbia University.

2G. K. Chesterton, ' Heretics,' London and New York, 1905, p. 15.

vol. lxx. — 13.

i94 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

I have no right to assume that many of you are students of the cosmos
in the class-room sense, yet here I stand desirous of interesting you
in a philosophy which to no small extent has to be technicaly treated.
I wish to fill you with sympathy with a contemporaneous tendency in
which I profoundly believe, and yet I have to talk like a professor to
you who are not students. Whatever universe a professor believes in
must at any rate be a universe that lends itself to lengthy discourse.
A universe definable in two sentences is something for which the pro-
fessorial intellect has no use. No faith in anything of that cheap
kind ! I have heard friends and colleagues try to popularize philos-
ophy in this very hall, but they soon grew technical, and then dry, and
the results were only partially encouraging. So my enterprise is a
bold one. The founder of pragmatism himself recently gave a course
of lectures at the Lowell Institute with that very word in its title —
flashes of brilliant light relieved against Cimmerian darkness ! None
of us, I fancy, understand all that he said — yet here I stand, making
a very similar venture.

I risk it because the very lectures I speak of drew — they brought
good audiences. There is, it must be confessed, a curious fascination
in hearing deep things talked about, even though neither we nor the
disputants understand them. We get the problematic thrill, we
feel the presence of the vastness. Let a controversy begin in a
smoking-room anywhere, about free-will or God's omniscience, or good
and evil, and see how every one in the place pricks up his ears. Phi-
losophy's results concern us all most vitally, and philosophy's queerest
arguments tickle agreeably our sense of subtlety and ingenuity.

Believing in philosophy myself devoutly, and believing also that
a kind of new dawn is breaking upon us philosophers, I feel impelled,
per fas aut nefas, to try to impart to you some news of the situation.

Philosophy is at once the most sublime and the most trivial of
human pursuits. It both works in the minutest crannies and opens
out the widest vistas. It e bakes no bread,' as has been said, but it
can inspire our souls with courage; and repugnant as its manners, its
doubting and challenging, its quibbling and dialectics, often are to
common people, no one of us can get along without the far-flashing
beams of light it sends over the world's perspectives. These illumina-
tions, at least, and the contrast-effects of darkness and mystery that
accompany them, give to what it says an interest that is more than
professional or technical.

The history of philosophy is to a great extent that of a certain
clash of human temperaments. Undignified as such a treatment may
seem to some of my colleagues, I shall have to take account of this
clash and explain a good many of the divergencies of philosophers by
it. Of whatever temperament a professional philosopher is, he tries

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 195

when philosophizing to sink the fact of his temperament, Tempera-
ment is no conventionally recognized reason, and he urges impersonal
reasons only for his conclusions. Yet his temperament really gives
him a stronger bias than any of his more strictly objective premises.
It loads the evidence for him one way or the other, making for a
more sentimental or a more hard-hearted view of the universe, just
as this or that fact or principle would. He trusts his temperament.
Wanting a universe that suits it, he believes in any representation of
the universe that does suit it. He feels men of opposite temper to
be out of key with the world's character, and in his heart considers
them incompetent, and 'not in it,' in the philosophic business, even
though they may far excel him in dialectical ability.

Yet in the forum he can make no claim, on the bare ground of his
temperament, to superior discernment or authority. There arises thus
a certain insincerity in the philosophic discussion. The potentest of
all our premises is never mentioned. I am sure it would contribute
to clearness if in these lectures we should break this rule and mention
it, and I accordingly feel free to do so.

Of course I am talking here of very positively marked men, men
of radical idiosyncracy, who have set their stamp and likeness on
philosophy and figure in its history. Plato, Locke, Hegel, Spencer,,
are such temperamental thinkers. Most of us have, of course, no
very definite intellectual temperament, we are a mixture of opposite
ingredients, each one present very moderately. We hardly know our
own preferences, in abstract matters; some are easily talked out of
them, and end by following the fashion or taking up with the beliefs
of the most impressive philosopher in their neighborhood, whoever he
may be. But the one thing that has counted so far in philosophy is that
a man should see things, see them straight in his own peculiar way,
and be dissatisfied with any opposite way of seeing them. There is
no reason to suppose that this strong temperamental vision is from now
onward to count no longer in the history of man's beliefs.

Now the particular difference of temperament that I have in mind
in making these remarks is one that has counted in literature, art,
government and manners as well as in philosophy. In manners we
find formalists and free and easy persons. In government, authori-
tarians and anarchists. In literature, purists or academicals, and
realists. In art, classics and romantics. You recognize these con-
trasts as familiar; well, in philosophy we have a very similar con-
trast expressed in the pair of terms ' rationalist ' and i empiricist,' ' em-
piricist ' meaning your lover of facts in all their crude variety, ' ra-
tionalist ' meaning your devotee to abstract and eternal principles.
]NTo one can live an hour without both facts and principles, so it is
a difference rather of emphasis, yet it breeds antipathies of the most

1 96 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

pungent character between those who lay the emphasis differently ; and
we shall find it extraordinarily convenient to express a certain con-
trast in men's ways of taking their universe, by talking of the ' em-
piricist ' and of the ' rationalist ' temper. These terms make the con-
trast simple and massive.

More simple and massive than are usually the men of whom the
terms are predicated. For every sort of permutation and combination
is possible in human nature; and if I now proceed to define more
fully what I have in mind when I speak of rationalists and empiricists,
by adding to each of those titles some secondary qualifying character-
istics, I beg you to regard my conduct as to a certain extent arbitrary.
I select types of combination that nature offers very frequently, but
by no means uniformly, and I select them solely for their convenience
in helping me to my ulterior purpose of characterizing pragmatism.
Historically we find the terms ' intellectualism ' and ' sensationalism '
used as synonyms of ' rationalism ' and ' empiricism.' Well, nature
seems to combine most frequently with intellectualism an idealistic
and optimistic tendency. Empiricists on the other hand are not un-
commonly materialistic, and their optimism is apt to be decidedly
conditional and tremulous. Eationalism is always monistic. It starts
from wholes and universals and makes much of the unity of things.
Empiricism starts from the parts, and makes of the whole a collection
— is not averse therefore to calling itself pluralistic. Eationalism
usually considers itself more religious than empiricism, but there is
much to say about this claim, so I merely mention it. It is a true
claim when the individual rationalist is what is called a man of
feeling, and when the individual empiricist prides himself on being
hard-headed. In that case the rationalist will usually also be in favor
of what is called free-will, and the empiricist will be a fatalist — I use
the terms most popularly current. The rationalist finally will be of
dogmatic temper in his affirmations, while the empiricist may be more
sceptical and open to discussion.

I will write these traits down in two columns. I think you will
practically recognize the two types of mental make-up that I mean
if I head the columns by the titles ' tender-minded ' and ' tough-
minded ' respectively.

The Tender-minded The Tough-minded

Rationalistic (going by ' principles '), Empiricist (going by ' facts '),

Intellectualistic, Sensationalistic,

Idealistic, Materialistic,

Optimistic, Pessimistic,

Religious, Irreligious,

Freewillist, Fatalistic,

Monistic, Pluralistic,

Dogmatical. Sceptical.

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 197

Pray postpone for a moment the question whether the two con-
trasted mixtures which I have written down are each inwardly coherent
and self-consistent or not — I shall very soon have a good deal to say
on that point. It suffices for our immediate purpose that tender-
minded and tough-minded people, characterized as I have written them
down, do both exist. Each of you probably knows some well-marked
example of each type, and you know what each example thinks of the
example on the other side of the line. They have a low opinion of
each other. Their antagonism, whenever as individuals their tempera-
ments have been intense, has formed in all ages a part of the philo-
sophic atmosphere of the time. It forms a part of the philosophic
atmosphere to-day. The tough think of the tender as sentimentalists
and soft-heads. The tender feel the tough to be unrefined, callous,
or brutal. Their mutual reaction is very much like that that takes
place when Bostonian tourists mingle with a population like that of
Cripple Creek. Each type believes the other to be inferior to itself;
but disdain in the one case is mingled with amusement, in the other
it has a dash of fear.

Now, as I have already insisted, few of us are tender-foot Bos-
tonians pure and simple, and few are typical Rocky Mountain toughs,
in philosophy. Most of us have a hankering for the good things on
both sides of the line. Facts are good, of course — give us lots of facts.
Principles are good — give us plenty of principles. The world is in-
dubitably one if you look at it in one way, but as indubitably is it
many, if you look at it in another. It is both one and many — let us
adopt a sort of pluralistic monism. Everything, of course, is neces-
sarily determined, and yet of course our wills are free: a sort of
free-will determinism is the true philosophy. The evil of the parts
is undeniable ; but the whole can't be evil : so practical pessimism may
be combined with metaphysical optimism. And so forth — your ordi-
nary philosophic layman never being a radical, never straightening
out his system, but living vaguely in one plausible compartment of
it or another to suit the temptations of successive hours.

But some of us are more than mere laymen in philosophy. We
are worthy of the name of amateurs, and are vexed by too much incon-
sistency and vacillation in our creed. We cannot preserve a good in-
tellectual conscience so long as we keep mixing incompatibles from
opposite sides of the line.

And now I come to the first positively important point which I
wish to make. Never were as many men of a decidedly empiricist
proclivity in existence as there are at the present day. Our children,
one may say, are almost born scientific. But our esteem for facts has
not neutralized in us all religiousness. It is itself almost religious.
Our scientific temper is devout. Now take a man of this type, and

1 98 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

let him be also a philosophic amateur, unwilling to mix a hodge-podge
system after the fashion of a common layman, and what does he find
his situation to be in this blessed year 1906? He wants facts; he
wants science; but he also wants a religion. And being an amateur
and not an independent originator in philosophy he naturally looks
for guidance to the experts and professionals whom he finds already
in the field. A very large number of you here present, possibly a
majority of you, are amateurs of just this kind.

Now what sorts of philosophy do you find actually offered to meet
your need? You find an empirical philosophy that is not religious
enough, and a religious philosophy that is not empirical enough for
your purpose. If you look to the quarter where facts are most con-
sidered you find the whole tough-minded program in operation, and
the ' conflict between science and religion ' in full blast. Either it
is that Eocky Mountain tough of a Haeckel with his materialistic
monism, his ether-god and his jest at our God as a ' gaseous vertebrate,'
or it is Spencer treating the world's history as a redistribution of
matter and motion solely, and bowing religion politely out at the
front door : she may indeed continue to exist, but she must never
show her face inside the temple.

For one hundred and fifty years past the progress of science has
seemed to mean the enlargement of the material universe and the
diminution of man's importance. The result is what one may call the
growth of naturalistic or positivistic feeling. Man is no lawgiver to
nature, he is an absorber. She it is who stands firm ; he it is who must
accommodate himself. Let him record truth, cold though it be, and
submit to it ! The romantic human spontaneity is gone, the vision is
materialistic and depressing. Ideals appear as inert by-products of
physiology, what is higher is explained by what is lower and treated
forever as a case of ' nothing but ' — nothing but something else of a
quite inferior sort. You get, in short, a materialistic universe, in
which only the radically tough-minded can live congenially.

If now, on the other hand, you turn to the religious quarter for
consolation, and take counsel of the tender-minded philosophies, what
do you find?

Eeligious philosophy in our day and generation is, among us
English-reading people, of two main types. One of these is more
radical and aggressive, the other has more the air of fighting a slow
retreat. By the more radical wing of religious philosophy I mean the
so-called transcendental idealism of the Anglo-Hegelian school, the
philosophy of such men as Green, the Cairds, Bosanquet and Eoyce.
This philosophy has greatly influenced the more studious members of
our protestant ministry. It is pantheistic, and undoubtedly it has
already blunted the edge of the traditional theism in protestantism
at large.

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 199

That theism remains, however. It is the lineal descendent,
through one stage of concession after another, of the dogmatic scho-
lastic theism still taught rigorously in the seminaries of the Catholic
Church. For a long time it used to be called among us the philosophy
of the Scottish school. It is what I meant by the philosophy that has
the air of fighting a slow retreat. Between the encroachments of the
Hegelians and other ' philosophers of the absolute/ on the one hand,
and those of the scientific evolutionists and agnostics, on the other, the
men that give us this kind of a philosophy, James Martineau, Pro-
fessor Bowne, Professor Ladd and others, must feel themselves rather
tightly squeezed. Fair-minded and candid as you like, this philosophy
is not radical in temper. It is eclectic, a thing of compromises, that
seeks a modus vivendi above all things. It accepts the facts of Dar-
winism, the facts of cerebral physiology, but it does nothing active or
enthusiastic with them. It lacks the victorious and agressive note.
It lacks prestige in consequence, whereas absolutism has a certain
prestige due to the more radical style of it.

These on the whole are what you have to choose between if you turn
to the tender-minded school. And if you are the lovers of facts I
have supposed you to be, you find the trail of the serpent of rational-
ism, of intellectualism, over everything that lies on that side of the
line. You escape indeed the materialism that goes with the reigning
empiricism; but you pay for your escape by losing contact with the
concrete parts of life. The more absolutistic philosophers dwell on so
high a level of abstraction that they never even try to come down.
The absolute mind which they offer us, the mind that makes our
universe by thinking it, might, for all they ever tell us to the con-
trary, have made any one of a million other universes just as well as
this. You can deduce no single actual particular from the notion of
it. It is compatible with any state of things whatever being true here
below. And the theistic God is almost as sterile a principle. You
have to go to the world which he has created to get any inkling of his
actual character, he is the kind of God that has once for all made that
kind of a world. Yet the theistic writers do not replace the old
rationalist definitions of him by any new empirical constructions.
Their system still lives on purely abstract heights. Absolutism has a
certain sweep and dash about it, while the usual theism is more
'insipid.' But both are equally remote and vacuous. What you
want is a philosophy that will not only exercise your powers of intel-
lectual abstraction, but that will also make connection with this actual
world of our own finite human experiences.

You want a system that will combine both things, the scientific
loyalty to facts and willingness to take account of them, the spirit of
adaptation and accommodation, in short, but also the old confidence

2oo POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

in human values and the resultant spontaneity — and this is then your
dilemma. You find the two parts of your qucesitum hopelessly sepa-
rated, you find empiricism with irreligion; or else a rationalistic phi-
losophy that indeed may call itself religious but that keeps out of all
definite touch with concrete facts and joys and sorrows.

I am not sure how many of you live close enough to philosophy to
realize fully what I mean by the last reproach, so I will dwell a little
longer on that unreality in all rationalistic systems by which your
serious believer in facts is so apt to feel repelled.

I wish that I had saved the first couple of pages of a thesis which
a student handed me a year or two ago. They illustrated my point
so clearly that I am sorry I can not read them to you now. This
young man, who was a graduate of some western college, began by
saying that he had always taken for granted that when you entered
a philosophic class-room you had to open relations with a universe
entirely distinct from the one you left behind you in the street. The
two were supposed, he said, to have so little to do with each other, that
you could not possibly occupy your mind with them at the same time.
The world of concrete personal experiences to which the street belongs
is multitudinous beyond imagination, tangled, muddy, painful and
perplexed. The world to which your philosophy-professor introduces
you is simple, clean and noble. The contradictions of real life are
absent from it. Its architecture is classic. Principles of reason
trace its outlines, logical necessities cement its parts. Purity and
dignity are what it most expresses. It is a kind of marble temple
shining on a hill.

In point of fact it is far less an account of this actual world than
a clear addition built upon it, a classic sanctuary in which the rational-
ist fancy may take refuge from the intolerably confused and gothic
character which mere facts present. It is no explanation of our con-
crete universe, it is another thing altogether, a substitute for it, a
remedy, a way of escape.

Its temperament, if I may use the word temperament here, is
utterly alien to the temperament of existence in the concrete. Re-
finement is what characterizes our intellectualist philosophies. They
exquisitely satisfy that craving for a refined object of contemplation
which is so powerful an appetite of the mind. But I ask you in all
seriousness to look abroad on this colossal universe of concrete facts,
on their awful bewilderments, their surprises and cruelties, on the
wildness which they show, and then to tell me whether ' refined ' is the
one inevitable adjective that springs to your lips, when you endeavor
to express the temperament of what you see.

Refinement has its place in things, true enough. But a philosophy
that breathes out nothing but refinement will never satisfy the em-

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 201

piricist temper of mind. It will seem rather a monument of arti-
ficiality. So we find men of science preferring to turn their backs on
metaphysics as on something altogether cloistered and spectral, and
practical men shaking philosophy's dust off their feet and following the
call of the wild.

Truly there is something a little ghastly in the satisfaction with
which a pure but unreal system will fill a rationalist mind. Leibnitz
was a rationalist mind, with infinitely more interest in facts than
most rationalist minds can show. Yet if you wish for superficiality
incarnate, you have only to read that charmingly written Theodicee
of his, in which he sought to justify the ways of God to man, and to
prove that the world we live in is the best of possible worlds. Let me
quote a specimen of what I mean.

Among other obstacles to his optimistic philosophy, it falls to
Leibnitz to consider the number of the eternally damned. That it is
infinitely greater, in our human case, than that of those saved he as-
sumes as a premise from the theologians, and then proceeds to argue
in this way. Even then, he says :

The evil will appear as almost nothing in comparison with the good, if we
once consider the real magnitude of the City of God. Coelius Secundus Curio
has written a little hook, ' De Amplitudine Eegni Coelestis,' which was reprinted
not long ago. But he failed to compass the extent of the kingdom of the heavens.
The ancients had small ideas of the works of God. ... It seemed to them that
only our Earth had inhabitants, and even the notion of our antipodes gave them
pause. The rest of the world for them consisted of some shining globes and a
few crystalline spheres. But to-day, whatever be the limits that we may grant
or refuse to the Universe we must recognize in it a countless number of globes,
as big as ours or bigger, which have just as much right as it has to support
rational inhabitants, though it does not follow that they need all be men. Our
earth is only one among the six principal satellites of our sun. As all the fixed
stars are suns, one sees how small a place among visible things our earth takes
up, since it is only a satellite of one among them. Now all these suns may be
inhabited by none but happy creatures; and nothing obliges us to believe that
the number of damned persons is very great; for a very feiv instances and samples
ivould suffice for the utility which good draios from evil. Moreover, since there
is no reason to suppose that there are stars everywhere, may there not be a great
space beyond the region of the stars? And this immense space, surrounding all
this region, . . . may be replete with happiness and glory. . . . What now be-
comes of the consideration of our Earth and of its denizens? Does it not
dwindle to something incomparably less than a physical point, since our earth is
but a point compared with the distance of the fixed stars. Thus the part of the
universe which we know, being almost lost in nothingness compared with that
which is unknown to us, and yet which we are obliged to admit; and all the
evils that we know lying in this almost-nothing; it follows that the evils may be
almost-nothing in comparison with the goods that the Universe contains.

Leibnitz continues elsewhere :

There is a kind of justice which aims neither at the amendment of the
criminal, nor at furnishing an example to others, nor at the reparation of the

202 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

injury. This justice is founded in pure fitness, which finds a certain satisfac-
tion in the expiation of a wicked deed. The Socinians and Hobbes objected to
this punitive justice, which is properly vindictive justice and which God has
reserved for himself at many junctures. ... It is always founded in the fitness
of things, and satisfies not only the offended party, but all wise lookers-on, even
as beautiful music or a fine piece of architecture satisfies a well-constituted mind.
It is thus that the torments of the damned continue, even though they serve no
longer to turn any one away from sin, and that the rewards of the blest con-
tinue, even though they confirm no one in good ways. The damned draw to
themselves ever new penalties by their continuing sins, and the blest attract
ever fresh joys by their unceasing progress in good. Both facts are founded on
the principle of fitness, . . . for God has made all things harmonious in perfec-
tion as I have already said.

Leibnitz's feeble grasp of reality is too obvious to need comment
from me. It is evident that no realistic image of the experience of
a damned soul had ever entered his mind. Nor had it occurred to him
that the smaller is the number of l samples ' of the genus lost-soul
whom God throws as a sop to the eternal fitness, the more unequitably
grounded is the glory of the blest. What he gives us is a cold literary
exercise, whose cheerful substance even hell-fire does not warm.

And do not tell me that to show the shallowness of rationalist
philosophizing I have had to go back to a shallow wigpated age. The
optimism of present-day rationalism sounds just as shallow to the fact-
loving mind. The actual universe is a thing wide open, but rational-
ism makes systems, and systems must be closed. Perfection for men
in practical life is something far off and still in process of achieve-
ment. This for rationalism is but the illusion of the finite and
relative. The absolute ground of things is a perfection eternally
complete.

I find a splendid example of revolt against the airy and shallow
optimism of current religious philosophy in a publication of that
valiant anarchistic writer Morison I. Swift. Mr. Swift's anarchism
goes a little farther than mine does, but I confess that I sympathize
a good deal, and some of you, I know, will sympathize heartily with his
dissatisfaction with the idealistic optimisms now in vogue. He begins
his pamphlet on ' Human Submission ' with a series of city reporter's
items from newspapers (suicides, deaths from starvation and the like)
as specimens of our civilized regime. For instance:

After trudging through the snow from one end of the city to the other in
the vain hope of securing employment, and with his wife and six children with-
out food and ordered to leave their home in an upper east-side tenement house
because of non-payment of rent, John Corcoran, a clerk, to-day ended his life by
drinking carbolic acid. Corcoran lost his position three weeks ago through ill-
ness and during the period of idleness his scanty savings disappeared. Yester-
day he obtained work with a gang of city snowshovelers, but he was too weak

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 203

from illness and was forced to quit after an hour's trial with the shovel. Then
the weary task of looking for employment was again resumed. Thoroughly dis-
couraged, Corcoran returned to his home last night to find his wife and children
without food and the notice of dispossession on the door. On the following
morning he drank the poison.

The records of many more such cases lie before me [Mr. Swift goes on] ; an
encyclopedia might easily be filled with their kind. These few I cite as an inter-
pretation of the Universe. ' We are aware of the presence of God in his world '
says a writer in a recent English review. [The very presence of ill in the tem-
poral order is the condition of the perfection of the eternal order, writes Pro-
fessor Royce ('The World and the Individual,' II., 385) .] ' The Absolute is the
richer for every discord and for all the diversity which it embraces,' says F. H.
Bradley (' Appearance and Reality,' 204). He means that these slain men make
the universe richer, and that is philosophy. But while Professors Royce and
Bradley and a whole host of guileless thoroughfed thinkers are unveiling Reality
and the Absolute and explaining away evil and pain, this is the condition of the
only beings known to us anywhere in the universe with a developed conscious-
ness of what the universe is. What these people experience is Reality. It gives
us an absolute phase of the universe. It is the personal experience of those best
qualified in our circle of knowledge to have experience, to tell us what is. Now
what does thinking about the experience of these persons come to, compared to
directly and personally feeling it as they feel it? The philosophers are dealing
in shades, while those who live and feel know truth. And the mind of mankind
— not yet the mind of philosophers and of the proprietary class — but of the
great mass of the silently thinking men and feeling men, is coming to this view.
They are judging the universe as they have hitherto permitted the hierophants
of religion and learning to judge them. . . .

This Cleveland workingman, killing his children and himself, is one of the
elemental stupendous facts of this modern world and of this universe. It can
not be glozed over or minimized away by all the treatises on God, and Love,
and Being, helplessly existing in their monumental vacuity. This is one of the
simple irreducible elements of this world's life, after millions of years of oppor-
tunity and twenty centuries of Christ. It is in the mental world what atoms or
sub-atoms are in the physical, primary, indestructible. And what it blazons to
man is the imposture of all philosophy which does not see in such events the
consummate factor of all conscious experience. These facts invincibly prove
religion a nullity. Man will not give religion two thousand centuries or twenty
centuries more to try itself and waste human time. Its time is up; its probation
is ended; its own record ends it. Mankind has not reons and eternities to spare
for trying out discredited systems. . . . What is man that thou art mindful of
him? Why, the answer is that thou art not mindful of him. Thou permittest
him to die like a weed, though with all the fiery sorrow that a sentient being
can feel.3

Such is the reaction of an empiricist mind upon the rationalist
bill of fare. It is an absolute ' No, I thank you.' ( Keligion,' says
Mr. Swift, ' is like a sleep walker to whom actual things are blank.'
And such, though possibly less tensely charged with feeling, is the
verdict of every seriously inquiring amateur in philosophy to-day who
turns to the philosophy-professors for the wherewithal to satisfy the
fullness of his nature's needs. Empiricist writers give him a material-

3 Morrison I. Swift, ' Human Submission,' Part Second, Philadelphia, Lib-
erty Press, 1905, pp. 4-10.

2o4 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ism, rationalists give liim something religious, but to that religion
' actual things are blank.' He becomes thus the judge of us philos-
ophers. Tender or tough, he finds us wanting. None of us may treat
his verdicts disdainfully, for after all, his is the typically perfect mind,
the mind the sum of whose demands is greatest, the mind whose
criticisms and dissatisfactions are fatal in the long run.

It is at this point that my own solution begins to appear. I offer
the oddly-named thing pragmatism as a philosophy that can satisfy both
kinds of demand. It can remain religious like the rationalisms, but
at the same time, like the empiricisms, it can preserve the richest
intimacy with facts. I hope I may be able to leave many of you with
as favorable an opinion of it as I preserve myself. Yet, as I am near
the end of my hour, I will not introduce pragmatism bodily now. I
will begin with it on the stroke of the clock next time. I prefer at the
present moment to return a little on what I have said.

If any of you here are professional philosophers, and some of you
I know to be such, you will doubtless have felt my discourse so far
to have been crude in an unpardonable way in an almost incredible
degree. Tender-minded and tough-minded, what a barbaric disjunc-
tion! And, in general, when philosophy is all compacted of delicate
intellectualities and subtleties and scrupulosities, and when every pos-
sible sort of combination and transition obtains within its bounds,
what a brutal caricature and reduction of highest things to the lowest
possible expression is it to represent its field of conflict as a sort of
rough and tumble fight between two hostile temperaments ! What a
childishly external view ! And again, how stupid it is to treat the
abstractness of rationalist systems as a crime, and to damn them be-
cause they offer themselves as sanctuaries and places of escape, rather
than as prolongations of the world of facts. Are not all our theories
just remedies and places of escape? And, if philosophy is to be
religious, how can she be anything else than a place of escape from
the crassness of reality's surface? What better thing can she do than
raise us out of our animal senses and show us another and a nobler
home for our minds in that great framework of ideal principles sub-
tending all reality, which the intellect divines? How can principles
and general views ever be anything but abstract outlines? Was
Cologne cathedral built without an architect's plan on paper? Is re-
finement in itself an abomination ? Is concrete rudeness the only thing
that's true ?

Believe me, I feel the full force of the indictment. The picture I
have given is indeed monstrously over simplified and rude. But like
all abstractions, it will prove to have its use. If philosophers can
treat the life of the universe abstractly, they must not complain of an
abstract treatment of the life of philosophy itself. In point of fact

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 205

the picture I have given is, however coarse and sketchy, literally true.
Temperaments with their cravings and refusals do determine men in
their philosophies, and always will determine them. The details of
systems may be reasoned out piecemeal, and when the student is work-
ing at a system, he may often forget the forest for the single tree. But
when the labor is accomplished, the mind performs its big summarizing
act, and the system stands over against one like a living thing, with
that strange simple note of individuality which haunts our memory,
like the wrath of the man, when a friend or enemy of ours is dead.

Not only Walt Whitman could write ' who touches this book touches
a man/ The books of all the great philosophers are like so many men.
Our sense of an essential personal flavor in each one of them, typical
but indescribable, is the finest fruit of our own accomplished philo-
sophic education. What the system pretends to be is a picture of the
great universe of God. What it is, — and oh so flagrantly ! — is the
revelation of how intensely odd the personal flavor of some fellow crea-
ture is. Once reduced to these terms (and all our philosophies get
reduced to them in minds made critical by learning) our commerce
with the systems reverts to the informal, to the instinctive human
reaction of satisfaction or dissatisfaction. We grow as peremptory in
our rejection or admission, as when a person presents himself as a
candidate for our favor. Our verdicts are couched in as simple ad-
jectives of praise or dispraise. We measure the total character of the
universe as we feel it, against the flavor of the philosophy proffered
us, and one word is enough.

' Statt der lebendigen Natur,' we say, ' Da Gott die Menschen schuf
hinein,' — that nebulous concoction, that wooden, that straight-laced
thing, that crabbed artificiality, that musty school-room product, that
sick man's dream ! Away with it. Away with all of them ! Im-
possible ! Impossible !

Our work over the details of his system is indeed what gives us our
resultant impression of the philosopher, but it is on the resultant im-
pression itself that we react. Expertness in philosophy is measured
by the deflniteness of one's summarizing reactions, by the immediate
perceptive epithet with which the expert hits such complex objects off.
But great expertness is not necessary, for the epithet to come. Few
people have definitely articulated philosophies of their own. But
almost everyone has his own peculiar sense of a certain total char-
acter in the universe, and of the inadequacy fully to match it of the
particular systems that he knows. They don't just cover his world.
One will be too dapper, another too pedantic, a third too much of a
job-lot of opinions, a fourth too morbid, and a fifth too cloistered, or
what not. At any rate he, and we, know off-hand that such philos-
ophies are out of plumb and out of key and out of ' whack/ and have

2o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

no business to speak up in the universe's name. Plato, Locke, Spinoza,
Mill, Caird, Hegel — I prudently avoid names nearer home ! — I am
sure that to many of you, my hearers, these names are little more than
reminders of as many curious personal ways of falling short. It would
be an obvious absurdity if such ways of taking the universe were
actually true.

We philosophers have to reckon with such feelings on your part.
In the last resort, I repeat, it will be by them that all our philosophies
shall ultimately be judged. The finally victorious way of looking at
things will be the most completely impressive way to the normal run
of minds.

One word more — namely about philosophies necessarily being ab-
stract outlines. There are outlines and outlines, outlines of buildings
that are fat, conceived in the cube, by their planner, and outlines of
buildings invented flat on paper, with the aid of ruler and compass.
These remain skinny and emaciated even when set up in stone and
mortar, and the outline already suggests that result. An outline in
itself is meagre, truly, but it does not necessarily suggest a meagre
thing. It is the essential meagreness of what is suggested by the usual
rationalistic philosophies that moves empiricists to their gesture of
rejection. The case of Herbert Spencer's system is much to the point
here. Eationalists feel his fearful array of insufficiencies. His dry
schoolmaster temperament, the hurdy-gurdy monotony of him, his
preference for cheap makeshifts in argument, his lack of education
even in mechanical principles, and in general the vagueness of all his
fundamental ideas, his whole system wooden, as if knocked together
out of cracked hemlock boards — and yet the half of England wants to
bury him in Westminster Abbey.

Why ? Why does Spencer call out so much reverence in spite of his
weakness in rationalistic eyes? Why should so many educated men
who feel that weakness, you and I perhaps, wish to see him in the
Abbey notwithstanding?

Simply because we feel his heart to be in the right place philo-
sophically. His principles may be all skin and bone, but at any rate
his books try to mold themselves upon the particular shape of this par-
ticular world's carcase. The noise of facts resounds through all his
chapters, the citations of fact never cease, he emphasizes facts, turns his
face towards their quarter; and that is enough. It means the right
hind of thing for the empiricist mind.

The pragmatistic philosophy of which I hope to begin talking in
another article preserves as cordial a relation with facts, and, unlike
Spencer's philosophy, it neither begins nor ends by turning positive
religious constructions out of doors. It treats them cordially as well.

I hope I may lead you to find it just the mediating way of thinking
that you require.

THE CENTURY PLANT 207

THE CENTURY PLANT, AND SOME OTHER PLANTS OF

THE DRY COUNTRY1

By Professor WILLIAM TRELEASE

MISSOURI BOTANICAL GARDEN

TT would be interesting if we might know whether Columbus and his
-L fellow voyagers noticed what is oddly called 'bamboo' by the
present islanders, when they first saw the Bahamas in the autumn of
1492. The plant, a striking one even to us, must have seemed still
stranger to Europeans at that time, for although Meyer and others
have attempted to show that the century plant was known in the
Mediterranean country as early as the eleventh century, and claim has
even been made to its recognition among the mural paintings of
Pompeii, a thousand years earlier still, Agave represents an essentially
American and very distinct type of vegetation which must have been
novel to those travelers into a new world. At any rate — they had little
time for botanizing — there is no evidence that this conspicuous element
in the Bahamian landscape was among the strange animals and plants
that they paraded on their return home, and, curiously enough, it re-
mains to-day without a published description or tenable scientific name.

The discoverers must have seen at least one other species of the
same type when, during this first voyage, they found the Greater An-
tilles; and the busy quarter of a century which followed, with its addi-
tions of the Lesser Antilles, upper South America, and a part of the
Gulf coast to the map of the world, undoubtedly revealed others.

The native name e maguey,' which still persists in Porto Rico for a
species of the related genus Furcrcea, was mentioned in Martyr's book
of 1516, and seems to have sufficiently impressed itself on the minds
of the adventurers to assume a generic quality, for they later trans-
ferred it to the fleshy-leaved agaves of Mexico, which the aborigines
knew as ' metl,' from which it is easily inferred that they had repeatedly
seen and discussed and inquired about these strange fleshy-leaved plants
with tall candelabrum-like inflorescence.

The most familiar of these plants in our gardens has long borne the
popular name of century plant. Everybody knows it — or thinks that he
knows it — to-day. Its rather narrow, somewhat grayish-green leaves
have a peculiar curvature and their ends frequently arch downwards in
a characteristic hooked form, while the prickles on their margins stand

'A lecture delivered in the Field Museum Course at Chicago, on October
13, 1906.

2o8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

on marked fleshy hummocks, and the short stout end spine is not con-
tinued down the border as it is in some species. Perhaps even com-
moner than the typical form are one with bright yellow stripes down the
sides of the leaves, and another with rather faint yellow lines distrib-
uted over the surface; and a still finer but much less common variety
has a broad stripe of yellow down the center of the leaf. Among
the cultivated variegated century plants one yellow-margined form, with
the green parts of a darker shade and the end spine long and slender,
has been distinguished for half a century under the name A. picta; but,
as with the variegated forms of A. Americana, nothing is known as to
its source or the first date of its appearance. Like the unvariegated
form, these yellow-margined plants are now becoming established along
the Italian Riviera.

When the American aloe, as it has often been called, was a novelty
in Europe, its flowering was one of the wonders of the world. Not only
did its size and form and the great age reached by some plants before
flowering excite interest, but odd rumors seem to have gone abroad con-
cerning its behavior. One of these gives indirect evidence of the long
persistence of a colloquial expression familiar to most of us to-day, for
Philip Miller, nearly two hundred years ago, gravely assured the British
public that the flowers of this plant do not really open with a report
like that of firing a gun, the then prevalent impression that they do so
probably coming from a misinterpretation of somebody's statement that
the flowering of a century plant ' made a great noise/ The phenomenon
has now become so common as to attract no attention about the Mediter-
ranean region, on the Channel Islands, and in the warmer parts of our
own country, where the plants grow out of doors and flower when they
are ten or fifteen years old; but it is still a matter of much interest in
the colder countries where they require the protection of glass houses
and develop slowly enough to suggest, if not quite to justify, their
popular name.

The century plant shares with or even surpasses the true bamboo in
its reputation of offering most of the necessities of human life. Food,
drink, clothing, building material, forage, military barricades, razor-
strops with soap and brush, medicine, pins, needles, paper, glue and
a red coloring matter are said to be afforded by it.

It is true that most of the indicated uses may be made of it, but
as a matter of fact the real century plant is very little used except for
ornament or as a hedge plant, though its leaf fiber is firm, fine and
white and used to a limited extent for the better class of cordage or
for a stiff thread peculiarly adapted to some of the ornamental lace-
work of the Azores and Mediterranean countries. Nearly all its reputed
uses actually refer to different if sometimes superficially similar plants
which have been mistaken for it, and the literature of e Agave Ameri-
cana ' is chaotic enough to tax the patience of even a botanist.

THE CENTURY PLANT

209

Perhaps the most curious thing that I can say of the real Agave
Americana is that nobody knows to-day where to seek it as a spontane-
ous plant, and, except about the Mediterranean, where it has spread
extensively, it seems to be found only as an obvious local escape from
cultivation. It looks very much as if the Spanish conquerors took
home, as one of their first illustrations of the maguey, a decorative
rather than a much-used plant, which even then probably existed only
in cultivation.

The traveler through that wonderfully interesting dry region to
the southwest of us, the Mexican tableland, has his attention at-
tracted by many of these candelabrum-bearing agaves. Even before
reaching Laredo, if he go by that gateway into the neighboring republic,

Fig. 1. Oddly called Bamboo.

he may see one large species, A. asperrima. If he enter by way of El
Paso from the east, another, A. Parry i, may draw his notice, or, coining
from the west, he may have seen another, A. Palmeri; and toward
Nogales, the entrance point for Sonora, one of the most striking of
them, with almost globose clusters of leaves, A. Huachucensis, is visible
from the train.

One of the most effective of these landscape-making plants covers
certain mountain-sides near Tehuacan, a health resort which every
visitor to Oaxaca and the wonderful ruins of Mitla passes through
after leaving Puebla. Its stately panicles are of a brilliant yellow,
and more beautiful than those of the ordinary century plant; and its
great rough leaves are so marbled with alternating greener and grayer
cross bands that it has received the distinctive name A. marmorata.

VOL. LXX. — 14.

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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig 2. Agave Picta.

Elsewhere about the same city, in company with a full dozen other
distinguishable agaves, is an abundance of the beautiful little white-
leaved plant, now popular in gar-
dens, which was named A. Ver-
scliajfeltii after its importer, some
forty years ago.

Even in Mexico it is the
planted rather than the wild
agaves that attract attention.
Hedgerows or dooryard specimens
of them are found everywhere, and
in the region to the south of the
City of Mexico ■ there are many
miles of territory seemingly de-
voted entirely to their cultivation.
Phalanx after phalanx of them
stretches away to the horizon as the
train speeds through, with hardly
a sign of other vegetation except
for a cottonwood or pepper tree
now and then where water happens
to occur, or a cypress marking
the resting place of the dead. Through this district, centering about
the little town of Apam, it is almost exclusively the dark green giant,
A. atrovirens, which is grown,
though, as with extensively culti-
vated plants elsewhere, in nu-
merous horticultural varieties
which look much alike to the bot-
anist but are distinguished by the
planter. Over thirty such forms
are said to be planted in the
plains of Apam. In the imme-
diate suburbs of the capital city,
about Tacubaya, and locally else-
where in this central district, other
forms, differing even to the un-
specialized eye, are similarly grown
in quantity. As one passes to the
colder regions of the north or de-
scends from the table-land into the
hot country, still other and dif-
ferent looking species of the same

type replace A. atrovirens, which, however, far outnumbers and sur-
passes them all in its aggregate farm importance. These plantations

Fig. 3. Dockyard Specimens.

THE CENTURY PLANT

211

are the basis of the pulque industry of Mexico — at once a large item
in its agricultural wealth, and one of the greatest curses to its peon
population, many of whom arc kept in poverty and sottishness
through it.

A philosophical historian- notes that man has never remained con-
tent with water as a beverage, and that agriculture, affording a means
of obtaining abundant intoxicants as one possible and alluring substi-
tute, has borne the curse of drunkenness in all ages. The discoverers
of the new world found the cultivation of the maguey or nietl, and
the production of a fermented drink, ' octli ' or ' pulque/ from its sap,

Fig. 4. The Dakk Green Giant.

an established industry, which even then had worked its fatal course
with the Toltec race.

The present traffic in pulque is large. Something over five million
barrels of it are used in the Mexican republic every year, of which
quantity about half is consumed in the capital city and much of the
remainder in Puebla and the other large cities of the central plateau.
Cheap as it is, for it sells for from one to three cents of Mexican money
for a large glass, its aggregate value amounts to several million dol-
lars gold, a year. Special trains are run into the City of Mexico every
morning for its delivery, as is clone with the milk supply of our own
cities.

2 Payne, 'History of the New World,' 1: 401, 404.

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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

In the Apam district, the plantations are chiefly found on the large
haciendas or estates. The first impression of a traveler who passes from
Vera Cruz to the capital is likely to be wrong if, as is usually the case,
he regard the table-land — so barren after the tropical vegetation in
and below the coffee country — as a desert with this strange industry as
its one resource. The observant person, however, sees, usually with
surprise, enormous stacks of straw here and there in the maguey
fields, each commonly marked with a great carved cross or other sym-
bol, and all carefully trimmed into house form ; and a shrewd infer-

Fig. 5. In Gardens in Sicily.

•ence that where there is a good deal of straw there must be some grain
is justified on a closer acquaintance with the country.

A first visit to a Mexican hacienda is an interesting episode in
one's traveling experiences. Comfort, as we understand it, is scarcely
to be had in the dustier regions during the dry season; and as one
looks over the barren country it is hard to see where food is obtained
for the swarm of peon retainers for whom even a church is not lacking
in the walled village which their dwellings constitute. The wealth of
such an estate is found in its extent. I recall the surprise with which,

THE CENTURY PLANT 213

after a day of blinding dust on a hacienda within sight of the
great snow peak of Orizaba, as I asked myself how people could find a
living in such a place, I noticed the arrival of a wagon-load of dry
fodder in the enclosure, quickly followed by another and another
and still others, until some twenty had come in — each drawn by five
mules. Then I began to realize the number of draft animals alone
that were engaged in bringing in the night's food for the others, and
was less surprised when, in droves of twenty or fifty, sheep and
cattle began to appear from remote points — until I ceased counting
and returned to my original question with even greater wonder. It is
on these large estates that the maguey — almost the only green thing
to be seen in the long dry season — finds its place as one of the many
forms of agricultural resource; the ground between them being fre-
quently made to yield an annual grain or other crop which the agaves
supplement as, here and there, they mature one at a time.

The pulque maguey is a large plant, and its rosette of thick leaves,
though appearing to lie next the ground, is really spaced along a stout
trunk as large as a small barrel. The whole, charged with sap, weighs
several tons. If left to itself, as it is in gardens on the Kiviera, where
it is called A. Salmiana, like the century plant it produces a gigantic
scape, topped with a candelabrum of flowers, when somewhere in the
neighborhood of fifteen years old. This is never permitted on the
large plantations, for the plant possesses its maximum value when it
has reached vegetative maturity and the scape is about to develop. At
the critical moment, known from the appearance of the central bud,
this is cut out and a shallow cavity is made in the crown of the
trunk, which is covered by a stone, pieces of maguey leaves, or other
protection. Into the cavity so formed the sap exudes. It is removed
two or three times a day, the surface being scraped and the cavity
slightly enlarged each time, until at last nothing but a thin shell of the
trunk remains, the leaves meantime having given up their content of
fluid and dried to their hard framework — as happens naturally during
the flowering period of all the larger agaves, when the reserve of sap
is drawn into the rapidly growing scape and flowers.

For a period of three months or more a good plant yields a gallon
or two of sap daily, and its value may be not far from ten dollars on
an average; from which it will be seen that a large maguey plantation
represents a considerable item in the assets of a landed proprietor of
the plains of Apam.

Often the peons who cut the matured plants fasten part of the-
bud leaves on to the spines of the outer ones, so that those in bearing
may not be overlooked as the tour of the plantation is made by the
laborers who gather the sap. One of these men, making his rounds,
is an odd sight. Over his back, usually separated from it by a zarape
or blanket if he is fortunate enough to have one, or by a piece of

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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 6. A Shell of the Trunk.

sacking if he is so poor as 4o feel compelled to reserve his zarape for
dress occasions, is swung from his forehead by a head-yoke a pig-skin,
supported by a sac, or more usually by a coarse net of cordage, and
sticking out from its open top is to be seen a long gourd of the type
that we call the Hercules club. In his hand he carries a short curved
knife. Plodding from one bearing plant to another, the Indian stops
at each long enough to uncover the cavity in its crown, press the smaller
end of the gourd to its bottom and, by sucking at the upper end, draw
into the lower part of the gourd the exuded sap, and thrust the gourd
over his shoulder into the pig-skin bag on his back — his finger mean-
time stopping the upper hole so that the fluid may not run out until
he wishes it to. A quick scraping of the cavity follows, the stone or

THE CENTURY PLANT 215

other cover is replaced, and he passes on. Sometimes he trudges home
with his burden as often as the pig-skin is filled; but on the larger
haciendas a burro, saddled with large bags of the same kind, awaits
him at one side of the field, and the work continues until at length
man and donkey go in with a full load.

The fluid which collects in the hollowed trunk of a cut maguey
plant and is gathered in the manner described, is called ' agua miel,'
or honey-water, because of its sweetness : nine or ten per cent, of its
weight is sugar, and this furnishes the basis for the alcoholic fermenta-
tion which is the chief factor in its conversion into pulque. The agua
miel of the Apam district is thin, clear and colorless. It is of a rather
pleasant taste if dipped from the plant in a gourd and free from
drowned insects, but fact or fancy gives it various reminiscent flavors
under other circumstances.

The fermentation practises in pulque making are still mostly
primitive. I have had a Mexican gentleman tell me that although
when the agua miel was gathered and fermented in a way to please
him he considered it a delicious drink, he would not think of touching
pulque as offered, for instance, at the railway station in Apam — where
the conversation occurred. The vats used are of ox-hide stretched on
frames, and they are usually three or four feet wide and nearly as
deep. Fermentation is begun by the introduction of a starter or
'mother of pulque' obtained by preliminary fermentation, and is
carried on without, or at most with little, artificial control of tempera-
ture, and under conditions of positive or negative cleanliness which
differ with the various haciendas.

When marketed, the pulque is a white, decidedly viscous fluid con-
taining about eight per cent, of alcohol; fermentation has not been
solely alcoholic, however, and its flavor is in part due to changes
wrought by bacteria of several kinds which are introduced with the
starter in company with the yeast. Continuation of the action of these
collateral ferments causes the beverage to spoil in a day or two under
ordinary conditions.

Familiar sights about Apam and in the capital are wagons loaded
with the large casks in which pulque is transported from the haciendas
to the railroad and again to the gaudily colored but often disreputable
and usually filthy shops where it is dispensed — from open barrels
into which glasses are plunged by hand with no greater care to prevent
contact with the human person than marks some of the earlier stages
in the conversion of grape juice into wine — and the patrons of which
are not prepossessing.

Where the maguey, though capable of cultivation, yields a lesser
or inferior product, agua miel is often more appreciated in its unfer-
mented state. As hawked around the streets of Monterey, for instance,
in porous earthenware receptacles, it is a cool yellowish fluid, that I

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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

must confess I find refreshing on a hot day — especially after I have
seen it gathered by means of a long-spouted tin pump and transported
in tin cans; and the limpid, yellowish, cidery, foamy product of its
fermentation in the north is more to my taste than the white, viscous,
odoriferous pulque of the Apam district — which alone pleases the adept.
With smaller production of pulque away from this center, more
primitive methods of transportation persist; the shipping cask of the
large producer, carried by a special train, may be replaced by the
burro-borne pig-skin; and, as I have observed in Tuxpan, the pulque
shop may give way to the street hawker, with an earthenware olla, the
contents of which from time to time are freshened up by being sucked
into and allowed to gush back, frothing, from a gourd of the sort used

Fig.

Making his Rounds.

in gathering the agua miel — the bowls of customers being filled by aid
of the same convenient implement.

Considerable medicinal virtue has been claimed for pulque, and
some efforts have been made to specially prepare, bottle and Pasteurize
it for medicinal or even table use, but, except in the region of its pro-
duction, where it is the common beverage, the bulk of it is used as an
intoxicant, pure and simple. From it is also produced a rather small
quantity of distilled liquor, ' mezcal de pulque.'

Away from the central district, where the product of a single plan-
tation is not sufficient to keep a fermentation establishment in profitable
operation, it is sometimes the practise of the growers to sell their plants,
as they mature, one by one, to a maker of pulque, whose employees,
trudging from one to another, attend to cutting them and gathering
their sap. Under these conditions, or where the market is still less
certain, the plants frequently succeed in sending up their scapes.

THE CENTURY PLANT

2 i 7

Fig. 8. Man and Dun key.

woody exterior, and cut into disks
a few inches long which may be
seen peddled around the streets in
Durango, for instance — to be split
into strips and chewed like sugar-
cane. If a distillery is at hand,
the leaves are often cut away from
a plant of this sort, or one that has
not been allowed to form its quiote,
above their very thick ' pencas ' or
bases, and the trunk, so prepared,
is marketable for the manufacture
of mezcal. From data obtained of a
peon, I once figured out that away
from the principal pulque region
the value of a plant is practically
the same whether cut for agua miel

Sometimes flowering is permitted,
and the plant yields nothing more
than a light rafter-pole, capable of
being sliced into good razor-strops,
a little green fodder for the cattle,
and a few dried leaves that may
be used for thatching a hut. At
other times the stalk, or l quiote,'
is cut down before the flowers have
too far sapped it, stripped of its

Fig. 9. Where Pulqie is Sold.

Fig. 10. Frothing from a Gourd.

or, after harvesting its quiote, sold
to the mezcal distillery.

Mezcal is a term applied com-
prehensively to the liquor obtained
by distillation from the fermented
juices of agaves. Four or five mil-
lion gallons of it a year are pro-
duced, and its value may amount
to some $2,000,000 gold. The
center for the manufacture of this
beverage is to the west of Guada-
lajara, and the town of Tequila,
situated there, has imposed its
name on the higher grade of
liquor, which is clear, smoky, rather
smooth, and with a characteristic
essential flavor; it usually con-
tains forty or fifty per cent, of

218

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

alcohol, and, like pulque, possesses certain medicinal properties.

Like pulque, mezcal is sold cheaply. It is to be found everywhere
and contributes largely to the demoralization of the native peon, who
often drinks it to excess and, like many another human type, commits
most of his crimes when influenced by alcohol. Those who watched
for the threatened revolution of the sixteenth of September last, prob-
ably noticed that the very wise head of the republic forestalled any large
demonstration by seeing that drinking places were closed throughout
the country.

To supply the distilleries at Tequila, a considerable acreage is
planted to mezcal agaves. Those most used there belong to a well-
marked, narrow-leaved species which a few years ago received the ap-
propriate and distinctive name A. Tequilana. As with the pulque spe-

FlG. Jl. QUIOTE. IN DURANGO.

cies, a number of horticultural forms of this are recognized. The leaves
are generally glaucous, and a field of these white plants produces a
striking effect. If allowed to bloom, this, too, develops a striking and
large candelabrum of flowers; but, like the pulque maguey, it is har-
vested when mature but before its saccharine food reserve has been
exhausted in the production of flowers and fruit. The leaves are cut
back to their thick bases and the trunks, so trimmed, are packed —
usually on mules — to the distillery, where, after a preliminary roasting,
still in rather primitive smoky pits, they are converted into a mash
which is fermented in large wooden tanks and then distilled in modern
apparatus, much as is clone in the production of liquors elsewhere. At
these modern stills, the bagasse from which the mash has been squeezed
by rollers is even packed away by half-naked laborers to be used to feed
the furnaces.

THE CENTURY PLANT 219

In addition to this mezcal de Tequila — or plain ' tequila,' that
made direct from the maguey trunks, and the mezcal de pulque already
referred to, a great deal of this sort of liquor is made from wild agaves
.of many kinds, throughout the length and breadth of Mexico ; indeed a
common if not universal distinction is made between the large
4 maguey ' species and the smaller ones, which are called 'mezcal'
like the beverage obtained from them. The process is everywhere essen-
tially the same in so far as the preliminary roasting and fermenting
processes are concerned; but the stills vary from the ordinary retort
type in its simplest form, with a ' worm ' cooled by flowing water, to
the most primitive apparatus by which a paying part of the alcohol
may be condensed into fluid form while making its escape from
the kettle.

While at Mitla, a few years ago. I was directed to a distillery of
this latter kind, not far from the prehistoric ruins for which the place
is famed, and my companion and I were permitted to make photographs
showing trimmed agave trunks newly brought in from the surrounding
mountains and sheltered from the sun while kept in storage, fuel for
the roasting pit, the wooden mash barrels and the maul used in crush-
ing the roasted material, the ox-hide fermentation vats supported on
rude frames of crooked wood, and the very primitive still of glazed
earthenware kettles, set over a crude oven, each capped with a saucer-
like metallic cover which was cooled as far as this could be done by a
stream of mountain water, while below it a funnel caught the con-
densed liquor and passed it through a reed spout into a waiting small
receptacle.

In northwestern Mexico, ' mezcal ' is largely replaced by ' sotol ' as
the distilled drink of the peon. This liquor, which has the general
character of the former, is said to be made in a similar manner from
the trunks of several species of the saw-leaved lilies (Dasylirlon)
which are commonly known as sotol and in the stock country are
frequently split open to enable animals to get at the pulpy nutritious
contents of their stems.

Among the early stories of the new world was an account of the
roasting of maguey trunks, and their use as food. They do not appear
to be largely used in this manner now, except by the nomadic Indians.
In the days of the Apaches, the roasting and eating of mezcal was
frequently noted, and the botanist or geologist who gets back into the
mountains still occasionally sees it. On our side of the boundary,
however, I understand that spectators are not welcomed at a mezcal
roast; and the impression has been left on the mind of one of my
friends that what was not eaten of the product was likely to undergo
fermentation and be saved from becoming a total loss by the aid of the
still — a practise on which our government does not smile so com-
placently as does that of the adjoining republic. Old mezcal pits are

220

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

not uncommon in southern Ari-
zona, where Agave Palmeri was
much eaten; and they are to be
seen in the Grand Canyon, in
northern Arizona, where A. U ta-
li ensis is abundant.

The most important economic
agaves are not the source of alco-
bol, but those which yield ' hene-
quen,' — a native name introduced
by Oviedo only a few years after
Yucatan was discovered. This, so

Fig. 12. White Plants.

far as Mexico is concerned, is prac-
tically a product of Yucatan, though
some of the other tropical states
yield a small quota, and it has a
yearly value of some $30,000,000
gold. A large part of it comes to
the United States for use in cord-
age, etc., under the name ' sisal
hemp ' or ' sisal grass,' which is
derived from a port of shipment.
Our imports for the past three
years average about $15,000,000
annually.

Most of the agaves have a
strong fiber in their leaves, the use
of which is prehistoric. That of
the century plant is particularly
white and fine, and, as I have said,
is considerably used. The fiber of
the pulque species, from the man-
ner in which the sap is gathered,
is little used; the very fleshy-leaved

Fig. 13. Half-naked Laborers.

Fig. 14. Sotol.

species are also hard to clean.
The Tequila mezcal is said to pro-
duce a good quality of fiber, which
— its harvesting not interfering
with the main use of the plants —
is coming to be regarded as a
valuable by-product of this species ;
and several other agaves are either
cultivated on a smaller scale for

their fiber or exploited as they occur spontaneously.

THE CENTURY PLANT 221

Henequen, however, is par-excellence the fiber agave. An inter-
esting minor chapter in our national evolution is contained in the
numerous appeals made to Congress about seventy years ago by our
former consul at Campeche, Henry Perrine, who desired a land grant
in subtropical Florida for the cultivation of this and other tropical
plants. The grant cost him his life, for he was killed by the Indians,
and the zone of henequen in this country scarcely goes beyond the
radius of his own tentative introduction of plants; but the Yucatan
industry, which in Dr. Perrine's day was small, though he saw a great
future for it if only the fiber could be less laboriously cleaned than it
then was by hand, has grown greatly, and the Bahamas, India, Hawaii
and tropical Africa are entering the field with more or less realization
of their expectations of gain from this crop.

Like the pulque maguey and the Tequila mezcal, henequen is repre-
sented in the larger plantations by several horticultural forms if not
by more than one distinct species. The one most grown in Yucatan
appears to be the taller form with long, narrow, prickly leaves, gener-
ally known to foreigners as white or gray henequen — and usually, but
wrongly, designated by botanists as Agave rigida elongata. A better
fiber plant is the entire-leaved green henequen, called Agave Sisalana
by Perrine, also, but to a smaller extent, grown in Yucatan, and now
spontaneous in tropical Florida from Perrine's importation. It is this
which has been introduced into the Bahamas and Hawaii, though both
the gray and green forms are being experimented with elsewhere.

The utilization of a henequen plant is not effected abruptly at the
end of its life, as with the pulque and mezcal species, but, after a
wait of five or six years, it extends over a period of from seven to four-
teen years, during which the annual yield is said to be from 20 to 40
leaves per plant in several gatherings — the number of mature leaves
removed each year determining the longer or shorter period during
which cropping may continue. One of the difficulties experienced in
trying to cultivate henequen away from the limestone terraces of
Yucatan has been that it goes to seed at too early an age, for this ends
its usefulness instead of at the same time bringing it to fruition as is
the case with the plants grown for pulque or mezcal, though its ex-
piring energy is said to be then thrown into leaf production by cutting
out the scape at its inception.

The cultivation of henequen in Yucatan is comparable with that of
the maguey on the plains of Apam, in that it is now chiefly in the
hands of large proprietors. Plantations are extensive, and the mills
for cleaning the fiber are proportionately large. The older leaves
are cut, at such intervals and in such numbers as the condition of the
plants is thought to warrant, and, after the prickles have been sliced
from their edges, trucked or carried on tram roads to the mill, where,
while they are still fresh, by means of some form of rotary scraper

222

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

(an idea tersely suggested by Perrine, and for the successful application
of which, as I read, a large sum was later paid to another) the pulp
is removed. The fiber, suitably washed and dried, is then baled for
export. In the state of Vera Cruz a plant of the same group has
recently come into local prominence, and is said to be considerably
planted under the name ' zapupe,' and to yield an excellent fiber.

One of the agaves longest known in gardens is that for which bot-
anists are now restoring the name A. Vera Cruz which Miller applied
to it, following its earlier polynomial designation of 'Aloe America
ex Vera Cruce foliis latioribus et glaucis.' Like the henequen, it
yields a fiber for which it is somewhat cultivated in the state of Vera
Cruz; and I understand that it is this species to which the 'Agave
Americana' of Indian fiber-culture reports refers.

In India, for a century and a half or more, has been known another
agave which is properly called A. Cantula, though it is frequently

Fig. 15. Palma Zamandoque.

spoken of under the name A. Eoxburgliii, which was given to it later.
Erroneously, it is even more often designated by the name A. vivipara,
which, as used by Linnams, belongs to a very different plant common
in the Greater Antilles. This species, the source of a considerable
quantity of Indian fiber which is known in the market as Bombay aloe,
and of a small but increasing amount of Philippine fiber under the
name ' Manila aloe,' is a close relative of the Tequila mezcal. Ade-
quate study will probably result in its final positive identification
with some American species; but at present it shares with another
Indian species of the same group the distinction of representing in Asia
a genus otherwise exclusively American — if the generally discredited
hypothesis that the century plant is indigenous to the Mediterranean
region be not true.

In comparison with the great cultures of henequen, all of the other

THE CENTUBY PLANT 223

utilization of agaves for fiber is of rather small importance. Never-
theless, considerably more than a million dollars' worth of so-called
' ixtle ' fiber is marketed in Mexico each year, in addition to a very
large quantity used locally for lassoes and other cordage and the like.
From the port of shipment, ixtle is commonly known as Tampico fiber.
Our imports for the last three years average about one and a quarter
million dollars in value. Unlike henequen, this is the product of
several distinct plants, of which a number belong to the very different
genera Yucca, Samuela and Hesperaloe, and in the tropics the name
is also applied to Bromelia fiber; but the larger part of the Tampico
fiber is obtained from two dwarf species of A gave. Comparatively little
of it comes from large plantations, except in the warm region above
Tampico, where extensive jdanting is now being undertaken — and a
large part of the exported ixtle is obtained from this district. Aside
from its Hesperaloe (' Zamandoque ') and Samuela (' Palma Zaman-
doque") constituents, the longer grade of Tampico fiber — which even
then is shorter than henequen — seems to be produced chiefly by an
agave spontaneous as well as cultivated in the state of Tamaulipas, and
known botanically as A. Funhiana. In the cooler country, especially
in the states of Coahuila and Nuevo Leon, a shorter fiber is obtained
from the closely related wild ' lecheguilla/ the native name of which
has been adapted by botanists into Agave Lecheguilla.

On the plantations, and possibly to a very slight extent elsewhere,
the fiber is cleaned by machinery, much as henequen is ; but a great deal
of it is still prepared laboriously by hand. It is here the central bud
or ' cogollo ' of young leaves, which is used, and not the harder old ones,
and the pulp is removed from the fiber by means of a hand scraper of
metal used against a supporting block of wood.

In the northern part of the republic, where, as in western Texas,
lecheguilla is extremely abundant over a large area, the extracted
fiber, sometimes used for brushes, bath pledgets, etc., is usually spun by
hand into cords or these into ropes on a primitive rope-walk, a child
twirling the strands as they grow from the apron-like bag of fiber
carried by the spinner. This is the common cordage of the country, and
is used for tying purposes, lariats and the like, as well as to make
sacking, saddle-bags, and the head-yokes with which the human beast
of burden always goes provided in that land. Visitors to Monterey
are often interested in the rope-walks, which may be seen anywhere
in the outskirts of the city, as well as in the manufacture of the
lecheguilla cord into coarse bagging which is effected in an equally
laborious and simple manner — the cord being woven into oblong mats
which are then folded across the middle and stitched down the sides,
everything being done by hand. The charm of these simple sights
to the tourist is largely enhanced by the general friendliness of the
workers, who are usually willing to chat or be photographed and whose

224

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig 16. Sechnguilla.

affection for their children is an
unfailing and very pleasing sight,
but the poverty of their homes,
only too evident to even the less
prying sight-seer, is scarcely com-
pensated for even in this affection
— which appears to me the best
quality of the Mexican peon.

The lecheguilla agave well pic-
tures a division of the genus in
which the flowers are clustered
along the upper part of the scape
instead of being disposed on the
branches of a candelabrum-like
top. Of this type is further the
'guapilla '— A. falcata — a very
narrow-leaved small species of the
region about Saltillo, which also
yields good ixtle.

The minor uses of agaves are
hardly worthy of detailed mention
in comparison with their commer-
cially important use as a source of
fiber and alcohol. These uses,
however, are many, as I have
already said. Under the name
1 amole ' one may buy in most
Mexican market places either leaf
bases of agaves like A. filifera or,

Fig. 17. Spinning and Weaving.

THE CENTURY PLANT

225

more commonly, rootstocks of the so-called herbaceous species, for use as
vegetable soap; the claim has recently been made that the sap from
henequen leaves in process of cleaning can be converted into a valuable
glue; and from the time of the Aztecs innumerable domestic uses have
been found for one part or another of these interesting plants.

So far as inference may go, it was none of the agaves of the earlier
discovered West Indies or Yucatan which was first taken across the
water, in small specimens for gardeners to care for and grow into some
semblance to their native form and size, but one or more species from
Mexico proper, to illustrate the wonderful ' metl ' of that land. The
importation may have been made very soon after the conquest of Mexico
by Cortez, but I find no record concerning it. It is even questionable
what species was actually first taken over. The first tangible record of
an Agave in Europe is given by
Clusius, a Belgian botanist who,
traveling through Spain somewhat
more than a generation after the
conquest of Mexico, found an aloe
of this kind sparingly cultivated at
Valencia, where he obtained off-
sets which he took home, and one
of which he figured in 1576.
While this first picture probably
represents A. Americana, as it is
usually supposed to do, it must be
admitted that it resembles also
the common pulque maguey of
the table-land, even then an
important plant, but which is
not known to have been in Eu-
ropean gardens before the middle
of the century just closed. In
1586 an American aloe flowered at Florence, and was figured by
Camerarius two years later. This picture is less questionable than
that of Clusius, as representing what we now call the century plant,
but it might possibly stand for what, a century later, was grown in
Dutch gardens as the broader-leaved aloe from Vera Cruz — now
known as Agave Vera Cruz or the synonym A. lurida. The reported
escape of the latter species in central Italy lends some support to this
surmise; but the picture can not be said not to represent A. Americana,
the wide-spread naturalization of which through the Mediterranean
countries seems to indicate conclusively that, whichever may have been
introduced first, it was really the century plant that was first extensively
propagated in Europe.

The agaves have been esteemed as garden curiosities ever since their

VOL. LXX. — 15.

Fjg. 18. Willing to be photographed.

226

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

historic r.iistn i r._
Aloe Americana. -,

44)

Fig. 19. The First Picture.

first introduction into the civilized
world, and many of them are
really beautiful plants; but while
one of them has leaves only an
inch long, the size of others is so
great as to render them unsuitable
for ordinary cultivation under
glass, and really representative col-
lections have been made by only
a few amateurs and botanical gar-
dens. About forty years ago a
taste for growing some of the
smaller species was fostered by
Belgian dealers who successfully
exhibited and advertised select
specimens of new importation,
some of which sold for very profit-
able sums; but I do not recall a
single one of the private collections
of a generation ago which is still
kept up, though fortunately some of the better plants have found their
way finally to Kew or some other botanical establishment.

Botanists have generally agreed
to date their scientific naming of
plants from 1753, when Linnaeus
substituted the convenient binomial
for the awkward if usually terse
description that had been used up to
that time when reference was made
to a plant. This date, consequently,
begins the modern history of Agave,
which, some years earlier, had been
segregated from the African genus
Aloe.

In his ' Species Plantarum/ pub-
lished in that year, Linnaeus de-
scribes only four species — one of
which, the ' cabuja ' of the tropical
mainland, belongs to a sufficiently
distinct genus, Furcrcea, which was
separated from Agave half a cen-
tury later. One of the remaining three is the century plant,
A. Americana-; another is a characteristic large species of the
Greater Antilles, A. vivipara; the other is an interesting little
plant of our own flora, with thin leaves which die down every

Hiiius altitude ex appieYi floris quantititemedlo-
Cfitcrconijcipoteft. Accuratadefcriptioextatapud
Czfalpinum. Nosiconcmdcdinms.cuni i ncminc
hadenus dcpifta fucrit. >

Althaa.

Fig. 20. Figured by Camerarias.

TEE CENTURY PLANT

227

winter, and a slender raceme of flowers, A. Virginica, which is
now made the type of a distinct genus, Manfreda. From the two
Linnaean species left after the segregation of Furcrcea and Man-
freda, the genus Agave grew step by step, through later discoveries, to
127 species distinguished by its latest monographer. Of these, 35
helong to the candelabrum group designated as Euagave and represented
by the two Linmean species, and 4(i have the flower-cluster contracted
as in A. Lecheguilla, constituting the group Littcea. The inflorescence
of the remaining 46 was not known when this monograph was written —
nearly twenty years ago, and a very large part of the species have been
known only through cultivated plants, most of which were described
when immature, and of which no inconsiderable number died or were
lost sight of before reaching a flowering age.

The describer of a garden species of Agave usually finds himself
impelled to set down its probable habitat as Mexico. In this guess he is

Fig. 21. Hotel at Maj.trata.

favored by the law of chance, for only a few agaves occur to the north or
south of Mexico or in the West Indies; but a considerable number of
intentional or chance hybrids have originated in gardens in addition to
some apparently purely cultural forms, the numerous descriptions of the
last two decades are widely scattered and little comparable, and the
genus stands to-day as one of the worst confused of its size — the actual
number of its species apparently being not far from 200.

There appears little hope of removing this confusion except by
protracted field study under unusually difficult conditions, supple-
mented by garden cultivation of plants from definitely ascertained spon-
taneous sources. Serviceable herbarium specimens are rarely seen.
Their preparation is unusually difficult because of the large size and
succulent nature of the plants, but they can be made. The camera is

228

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

as indispensable to the field student of these plants as the trowel or
drying press, and the data used by whoever may succeed in adequately
monographing the agaves will necessarily include habit pictures and
full-size details, photographed on the spot.

Anything which takes one into the pure air and bright sunshine of
the mountains brings in the enjoyment of these a full compensation
for the inseparable hardships of travel in a sparsely settled country
where the comforts of life are not to be looked for outside of the
larger cities, and where one frequently goes to bed literally with the
chickens or is stabled in the barnyard.

The agaves are preeminently plants of rocky places. Some of them
delight in hanging from the sides of cliffs which are all but inacces-
sible. Others grow in the middle of the great fields of broken ragged
lava to which the Mexicans have applied the expressive name ' malpays '
or bad lands. Collecting under such conditions is scarcely capable of
description without the unimpeachable evidence of the phonograph,
which is not yet generally recognized as a necessary part of the bot-
anist's equipment. I regret that while I have been able to show pic-
tures giving some idea of the obstacles to travel in the barrancas and
lava beds, of the altogether tantalizing places in which choice plants
are seen, and of the difficulties attending the transportation of those
that can be reached, I have no phonographic record fit for public
demonstration.

Fig. 22. Where Choice Plants are seen.

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

229

NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE

SEKVICE. IV.

BY fked deland

VII. Some Early Telephone Switchboards
ri iHE switchboards in the New Haven and other pioneer telephone ex-
-*- changes were far more crude mechanically than the marvelous
and sensitive hand telephone. The first switchboard that Mr. Coy
installed in New Haven had a capacity of only eight lines, but as
every line was a party-line, and as an average of twelve subscribers
were on each line, the board served a hundred or more subscribers.
This board was designed and built by Mr. Coy, in December, 1877,
with the aid of a local carpenter, and formed a part of the partition

that separated the office from the battery-room. So far as known no
photographs of the exchange or of the board were ever taken, and
when the partition was removed the switchboard no longer existed.
However, in Fig. 6 is an excellent reproduction of a rough sketch made
from memory many years ago, of what Mr. Coy asserts was the first
switchboard, though others claim that the board had no annunciator
attached during the first two months.

Crude as the construction of the board was. without cords or plugs,

230

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

clearing-out drops or other improvements that facilitate rapid service
on the part of the operator, it was considered a remarkable piece of
workmanship in its day, and prospective investors in telephone sys-
tems traveled from various states to inspect Mr. Coy's equipment and
to study the working method of this first of all telephone exchanges.
The switchboard used in the Meriden exchange, opened a few clays
after the New Haven exchange, is now preserved in the Smithsonian
Institution at Washington. It is similar in type to the New Haven
board, and was designed by Mr. Coy. The switchboard used in Rich-
mond, Va., as late as April, 1879, had six dials on its face, ' each circle
about ten inches in diameter, formed by thirty-nine numbers.'

Service from Mr. Coy's board was supplied after the following
fashion. On the shelf was a large induction coil with a manually
operated buzzing attachment (Fig. 7). This calling device was known

Fig. 7.

as ' Watson's squealer ' and also as ' Coy's chicken,' for the shrill squeal
it sent out over the line could be easily heard in all parts of a large
room. When ' Central ' desired to call a given subscriber on a party-
line, as No. 5, for instance, on party-line No. 8, the operator connected
this buzz-box to line No. 8 and sent five long squeals over the line,
which would be the signal for subscriber No. 5 to come in on the line,
and for the others to stay out.

For the use of his subscribers in New Haven, Mr. Coy hung the
mahogany or rubber-encased hand telephone on a steel hook screwed
into a black walnut board (Fig. 8) which he attached to the wall of the
subscriber's room or office. Binding posts for wire connections were
fastened to each corner of this board, with a simple strip type of light-
ning arrester connecting the upper two posts, line and ground. Near
the center of this board and bridged on to the grounded iron telephone
circuit, was a circuit-break push button for the subscriber to use in
calling ' Central.' Below the push button was inscribed the number
of the telephone.

Primitive as this outfit now appears, if was considered a luxury
in 1878 that many were glad to have, and practically constituted the

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

2\\

entire telephone equipment supplied to subscribers by the early tele-
phone exchanges. For as rapidly as other operating companies came
into existence, they copied or adopted Mr. Coy's equipment, modified
more or less according to the mechanical or artistic views of the local
manager or his manufacturer. A modification used in Richmond, Va.,
is shown in Fig. 9.

In one sense these magneto systems might be properly termed
central-energy exchanges. For though no batteries were required to
operate these pioneer hand telephones, all the current required to
signal ' central ' or ' subscriber ' was supplied from a ' common-battery '

Fig. 8.

Fig. y.

set of gravity cells maintained in the exchange and operating on a
closed circuit.

When a subscriber desired ' Central,' he touched the metal push
button, shown in Fig. 8, which actuated a single-stroke bell in the
exchange and released a drop in the ordinary house-annunciator at-
tached to the switchboard, thus indicating the respective party-line. On
hearing the bell, the boy-operator would leave whatever other work he
was engaged upon, walk leisurely over to the board, glance at the an-
nunciator, turn the single switch to the metallic strip to bring his
telephone in circuit with the calling subscriber, and loudly enquire:
' What do you want ? ' then place his telephone to his ear just too late to
catch the full reply. Louder explanations on both sides would follow,
and sometimes the subscriber's remarks were not of a character suitable

232

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

for publication, while the replies of the operator partook of the same
lurid nature. For there were no sissy-boys and no girls among the
pioneer operators of 1878-1880.

Finally, subscriber No. 5 would make the operator understand
whom he desired to be connected with. Then the connection was given
by turning the lever of one circle to the peg to which the calling-line
was attached (Fig. 6), and placing the lever of the other circle on the
peg or post connected to the line of the calling subscriber. The boy
would then go back to his other work and probably forget all about the
two subscriber-lines connected together, until an infuriated individual
would rush into the office and demand the reason why some blithering
idiot failed to answer his bell. Then the boy would have to pacify
the subscriber as best he could by explaining that when two subscriber-
lines were connected together, the call-bell and the battery-connection
on each line were cut out to improve the talking qualities, and each
subscriber was connected straight through to each other's telephone ;

Fig. 10.

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

233

that in the pressure of cleaning batteries, or sweeping the room or
doing some other kind of work, boy-like he forgot to disconnect the
circuits.

With Mr. Coy's first board two telephonic connections only were
possible at the same time. That is, two conversations only could be
carried on at the same time. If a third subscriber desired connection,
it was necessary to await the release of a lever by the disconnection of
one of the other lines. Then the bright thought occurred to the boy-
operator that by wetting the tips of his fingers and placing them on the
respective pegs, his arms would become the levers of the respective
circles, and thus the two subscribers could talk through his body.
This very ingenious makeshift served to tide over the brief period
during which an addition of two more circles was made to the original
board, thus increasing its capacity fifty per cent. But one day, while
the boy-operator was letting his wet finger-tips perform the service,
now taken care of by cords and plugs, the ring-off signal came in
from a subscriber who had just had a powerful magneto installed, and
the shock received ended that very convenient practice.

Soon there were more than
150 subscribers on twelve sub-
scriber-lines, and the ratio of
calls per subscriber was constant-
ly on the increase. So a new
board was planned by Mr. Coy
— and built by Mr. Snell, who is
still in New Haven engaged in
supplying equipment-specialties
to telephone companies. This
board (Fig. 10) had a line ca-
pacity of forty wires. Evidently
switchboards of this type found
favor for a time in the opinion
of the parent company; for a
circular issued in 1880, by the
National Bell Telephone Com-
pany, contains the following sug-
gestions, all of which were omitted from a circular of similar purport,
issued a year later by the American Bell Telephone Company :

There are several styles of switchboards that may be used, all depending
on the general principles for tneir operation. They consist essentially of
horizontal and vertical bars crossing one another and arranged so that any
horizontal bar can be connected to any vertical bar. It is chiefly in the
methods of making the connection that the various switches differ. In what
is known as the ' plug ' switch, the connection is made by inserting a small
metal plug at the point where the horizontal and vertical bars cross one an-
other. There are several forms of the plug switch. ... In what is known as
the slide central office switch, the connections are made by means of a sliding

Fig. 11.

234

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

contact plug, which can be moved on the vertical bars, and when placed over one
of the horizontal bars, springs into firm contact with it . . . (as shown in Fig.
11). The brass rods for connecting any two lines together are fastened to the
walnut frame, and in front of them but not touching, are the upright rods.
The line circuits, as they enter the office, are connected to the upright rods
by binding screws on top of the frame. Each of the upright rods has a
spring-slide which, when pulled outward, can be slid freely on the rod, and
which, on being released, springs into firm contact with any one of the hori-
zontal rods with which it may be desired to connect it.

Within a year the increase in the number of subscriber-lines in the
New Haven exchange made an additional board necessary. So a
Snell board having a capacity for thirty-five subscriber-lines was in-

i!i||ii|l|p™

g^'i^^jjF., Jf . \{r if pr $*■

Jtl,«/o>yJ'

jlji!ftrt>i/-0'l'ii*:

S^SS^3wSffiiffip^Fi

5-.:'i

'^il!H,iii'ptl«!|»tp!lilll,l»|,H!*|,Jlll?"lll,ll,liir

Fig. 12.

Fig. 13

stalled and connected to the old board. The principal feature of the
Snell board (Fig. 12) is the Snell jack (Fig. 13). The instructions
sent with the board read :

The line connects the levers together perpendicularly. The springs being
connected horizontally, form the connecting bars. Any two circuits are con-
nected by throwing the corresponding levers on the same row of springs. We
have testimonials from parties using the switch, where one operator does all
the work satisfactorily for three hundred subscribers, where with any other
system it would require at least two, thus making a permanent saving in the
running expenses.

A cheaper type of Snell switchboard is shown in Fig. 14, using what
are called ' tip-up jacks.'" This board consisted of an

inclined table, having as many grooves, about a quarter of an inch wide and
deep, as may be required for connecting bars. Between every third groove is
a row of counter-sunk holes for the wire posts inside of a spiral spring; a
smaller wire passing through the ends of the posts forms the line and acts as a

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

235

hinge for the little tip-up jacks, that connect the line with the brass plate on
the bottom of the groove. The spring allows the post to give a little, thereby
making a rubbing connection and holding the jacks firmly in their place when
any two are tipped up on the same groove to make connections.

The combined annunciator recording drop-plate shown on this Snell
board is of interest in showing the appreciation in those pioneer days
of the necessity of a measured-service system. Five falls of the plate
(Fig. 14) would cause one revolution of the shaft, which, in turn,
would move the indicating wheel one notch. A later form of switch-

Fig. 14.

Fig. 15.

board devised by Coy and Snell is shown in Fig. 16. A board of this
type was installed in Hartford in 1879. In December, 1881, in the
Providence exchange there were thirteen Post-Snell switchboards of
twenty-five wires each, four of fifty wires and one of sixty wires, ar-
ranged on three sides of the operating room, and from these eighteen
boards service was supplied to eleven hundred subscribers.

The switchboards adopted by other exchanges were as unique in
character as those erected in New Haven. In St. Louis, in April, 1878,
Mr. George F. Durant used a 'jump jack switchboard,' the operation
of which is thus described:

On the subscriber ringing his bell, the annunciator would fall and the
boy-operator would ask: 'What do you want?' Finding out what was wanted,
the boy would notify the switchman what connection was desired, which wras
made by two single plugs attached to a single cord, by placing one of the plugs
under each of the jacks requiring the connection.

The second switchboard had brass bars running the entire length of
the board, with holes about every five or six inches to insert the plugs

236

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

1 «.»*»** 1

EJfc**« |

ifcdHI ■ • 1- _r,^

■■■Km

SSbmb

Fig. 16.

into, and were connected to the disconnecting switch through an indi-
cator and jump jack.

In July, 1878, Thomas B. Doolittle planned and had constructed
by Charles Williams, Jr., of Court Street, Boston, a twenty-circuit
telephone switchboard, which Mr. Williams has stated ' was the first
switchboard completely equipped with signaling apparatus ever made
at my establishment.' This board (Fig. 17) was placed in Mr. Doo-
little's exchange at Bridgeport, Connecticut, which succeeded to the
first mutual telephone exchange system, and is the small board shown
in Fig. 18.

In 1877, Mr. Doolittle had made a small six-point cross-bar switch-
board for use in Bridgeport, in which he substituted simple switches
for the usual telegraph plugs, as the former were more easily manipu-
lated in making connections. Then he brought out the small board
above referred to. Meanwhile he devised his ' direct-connecting board '
(Fig. 18) in which each line terminated in the board after passing
through a single stroke bell, to the hammer of which was attached a
hollow brass ball suspended by a silk thread. To each circuit an op-
erator's telephone was attached, and the cords were of sufficient length
to reach the furthermost limit of the board. Following a subscriber's
call the stroke of the bell set the brass ball to swinging, thus notifying

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

237

a.-.A *r^ v- ^ S-- $■ + f

the operator, who cut off the battery by turning a switch and then
inserted a plug in the line socket and received the call. The com-
panion cord was then removed from the ground plate and inserted in

the socket of the line called for.
Mr. Doolittle states that on several
occasions he saw the operator take
care of four calls at the same time
by holding two telephones in the
fingers of each hand, that is, the
operator had to talk and then
listen into four separate tele-
phones ; in other words, using both
ears as well as both hands. Inci-
dentally it may be mentioned that
Mr. Doolittle claims that it was on
this board that the first female
telephone operator was employed.
A glance at the illustration shows
that the cylindrical wooden weights
suspended on the plug cords were
about an inch in diameter and a
foot in length, with a brass pulley
attached to the top of each. These
long weights were employed at first
in anticipation that their length
would prevent the cords from
swinging and tangling, but later
were displaced by smaller but
heavier lead weights.

According to a local paper the
switchboard erected in Philadel-
phia, in December, 1878, consisted of

a walnut frame and braced strips of brass punctured with holes, into which
wires are fitted to make the necessary connections. Behind this all the wires
converging in the office concentrate. The board accommodates 400 different
lines.

In October, 1878, the parent ' Bell Telephone Company ' issued
a circular describing a form of brass strip switchboard ' adapted for six
circuits.' On February 20, 1879, a circular was issued describing a
switchboard which could be supplied at

from 50 cents to $1 per circuit, according to the number of circuits. The
dimensions of this switchboard for from 50 to 200 circuits are 6 feet long by
about 3 feet wide.

Switchboard tap-bells were listed at $2.50 each; subscriber's hook
district bells, $3.25 each; spring keys, 75 cents each; lightning arrest-
ers, 37 cents per circuit. It was stated that " the following plan it is

Fig. 17

238

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

&|r$.».*.*l

J-J J4 1 1 M f J| J 1 1 J J J J J 4 ....

Fig. 18.

believed combines the advantages of the (thirteen) different systems."
A diagrammatic representation of the wiring of a single circuit in this
board is shown in Fig. 19. There is also shown a flexible cord attached
to a plug and a wedge of hard wood having a metal plate fastened to
one side. The instructions sent with the board read :

The local size gravity battery is used — one cell for each bell and for
each mile of wire is sufficient. A circuit one mile long having ten bells re-
quires about fourteen cells of battery. Two circuits may be operated by one
. battery if they are about equal length and

I have the same number of bells on each. . . .

K~w3 When any subscriber on this circuit wishes

to call the central office he presses his knob
twice, which rings the bell ; the operator
then inserts the wedge between the spring
and the plate, with the metal side against
the spring, and the plug into a brass strip
which is connected through a set of tele-
phones to the ground. This, it will be seen,
takes off the battery and connects the tele-
phones so that the operator can talk with
the subscriber and ascertain his wants. If
the subscriber wants to talk with a person
on another circuit, the central office calls
that person and on receiving his answer,
the two circuits are connected together by
inserting a wedge under each spring and
putting each plug into one of a pair of
brass strips which are connected together
through a hand telephone by means of which
the central office operator can ascertain
when the two persons have finished using
the circuits. Then he removes the wedges
and plugs and the circuits are ready for another call.

The instructions for the subscribers equipment read :

The circuits are run from the central office and grounded at the last

□

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

239

stations. A small electric bell is placed in each subscriber's house or office,
having a hook projecting from its base on which the hand telephone is hung

when not in use (Fig. 20). When the telephone is
removed this hook can be thrown either to the right
or left. When thrown to the right the line wire
on one side of the station is connected through the
telephones to the ground and the line on the other
side is opened, preventing any one on that side hear-
ing what is said. When thrown to the left the re-
verse is true. It is obvious that no person between
the two that are conversing can put his telephone in
circuit without breaking the line, and consequently,
interrupting the conversation. All other stations
on the circuit are notified that the line is being
used by the striker being away from the bell. In
this case the subscriber must not attempt to call or
use the telephone. The signaling is done by pressing
and releasing a knob the requisite number of
times. . . .

On June 12, 1879, the parent Bell com-
pany sent out photographs and a circular de-
scribing ' our No. 1 standard central office strip
switch arranged for seventy-five circuits.'

In November, 1881, Mr. T. D. Loekwood

said :

To make a good telephone exchange switchboard,
however, out of an ordinary telegraph switch, we
concede that considerable remodelling is necessary;
and after the first heat of invention was over, prac-
tical men began to look about them, to see the disad-
vantages they were laboring under and endeavor to
overcome them. It was seen that time and money
were, in telephone offices, the two main articles to be
economized. Time, because speed of connection is the
very life-blood of the business. Money, because in
many of the exchanges the telephone business was
managed and owned by men of little or no capital;
and, in others, the expense, in any case, would be great, and economy was neces-
sary to make anything at all out of the business. Soon, therefore, it became
obvious that the telephone switch must be compact; all the apparatus must be
easily and quickly under control; everything about it must be well made and
well put together; the motions required in a connection must be reduced to a
minimum, and yet the apparatus must be cheap. The cry of cheapness for a
long time obscured the vision of the practical man.

In 1881 came the first of the multiple switchboards. This inno-
vation was arranged for grounded and later for metallic circuits, and
was designed to eliminate many of the causes tending to slow down the
service. Under the previous system each operator was compelled to
act as information bureau, and subscribers called by name rather than
by number. The introduction of the mutiple board made necessary the
assignment of numbers to subscribers, and many an urgent request to
call by number rather than by name. Thus the multiple-board operator
made connections only in response to requests giving numbers. If
complaints were made or information requested, the caller was
quickly switched to the information desk presided over by a special
operator. In the same manner the toll calls were handled at a toll

Fig. 20.

240

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

board or special section of the large board. A 1,500-line multiple
switchboard was installed in New York in November, 1883.
In 1883 Mr. W. D. Sargent said :

The ideal (switchboard) system would be one in which the operator would
receive the orders to connect and disconnect from the subscriber orally, by
means of a head telephone; to have in front of her a switchboard by which
she could connect any two wires of the whole system, however large, without
interfering with the other operators. The nearest approach to this perfect
system at the present time is the multiple-board; but this has never been
worked on the true or multiple principle, and it can never show all its merits
until it is. The multiple-board is noAV being introduced into many of the
largest cities, and we may expect much information during the coining year
on its merits.

Now-a-days a new switchboard is often placed in service so quietly

that the subscribers are rarely aware of any change taking place until

after the work is completed. But in the pioneer clays it was somewhat

different, as is shown in the following interview clipped from an

eastern paper in 1882 :

In removing from the old to the new central exchange unforeseen difficulties
were encountered, chiefly in the removal of such a mess of wires and the
abrupt change from the old system to the new system (of calling), and the

Fig. 21.

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE 241

necessarily temporary character of much of the construction. The public had
to be personally taught to use the new system, and our operators had to be
educated in its rapid use. This naturally caused dissatisfaction, and before
the system was tried and the construction trouble was eliminated, our sub-
scribers, through misapprehension of the real purpose of the change, were
invited to meet and form an association to protect their interests and compel
satisfactory and perfect service on our part. . . . The association was soon
compelled to acknowledge the superiority of the new service over that of the old.

In March, 1883, there were thirty Gilliland switchboards (Fig. 21)
in the Pearl Street telephone exchange in Boston, and seventy-five toll
lines terminated there. These boards stood about a foot apart and were
displaced by a given number of multiple sections forming one compact,
continuous board. In referring to the installation of the multiple
switchboard in this exchange in 1884, Mr. Carty stated that

there were about 1,650 subscribers, ninety branch and thirty extra-territorial
lines. The extra-territorial lines were handled by five operators on the
25-wire boards, on each of which there were a dozen or more subscribers. This
called for a force of thirty-nine operators on tables at any one time, seven
operators for relief and seven night operators, making a total force of fifty-
three. With the multiple system only twenty operators are required to fill
the boards in the main exchange, with five relief and four night operators.
In the toll room, eleven operators are required, including the chief, one relief
and two night operators. This makes a total of forty operators, handling
1,700 subscribers, 152 trunk lines, and shows a saving of thirteen operators.

Incidentally, it may be added that the Boston board was put in at an
expense of $48,000. The old boards cost over $20,000, but brought
less than one tenth that sum when sold as junk, though in use less
than four years, and some less than two years.

In September, 1885, Mr. T. D. Lockwood suggested that where the
multiple board was to be installed it would be well

to get the numbers drilled into the subscribers first. I was in Baltimore eighteen
months ago, when the subscribers were all known by name. They were going to
change that, and they were also introducing the multiple boards at the same
time; and the operation of the new multiple boards was somewhat premature,
because the old boards fell to pieces about a week before the new ones were
expected and the change had to be made very quickly, and the change from
names to numbers, and from the old board to the multiple board resulted in
producing a condition of things very like a pandemonium for three or four days.

That the Western Union's competitive telephone service was of no
better character than that of the Bell, notwithstanding its long ex-
perience in serving the public and the far greater resources at its
command, is clearly portrayed in a description by a Times reporter, of
a visit to the Chicago exchange of the American District Telegraph
Company, in July, 1879. He wrote:

The racket is almost deafening. There are speaking tubes running all
about the room, which look not unlike small stovepipes, and at one end and
the other of these are placed the lips of one operator and the ear of another.
Boys and girls are rushing madly hither and thither, seemingly without
intent or direction; while others are putting in and taking out pegs from the
metallic surface of the central framework or switchboard as if they were
lunatics engaged in an old-fashioned game of fox and geese.

How different are present-day conditions in the large exchanges,
where the operating force is well disciplined and thoroughly trained,

242 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

and where the modern relay multiple switchboard affords every facility
for rapid intercommunication. So compact are these improved switch-
boards that each subscriber-line reappears in each and every section,
thus enabling any one of the three operators allotted to a section to
reach the jack connecting with the subscriber line of any one of the
many subscribers connected to that given exchange even though they
number ten thousand. Under these favorable conditions the average
time in which ' Central ' answers a calling subscriber rarely exceeds
four seconds, and a local call is completed on an average of less than
thirty-five seconds, the time consumed depending largely on the prompt-
ness with which the called subscriber responds to ' Central's ' calling.
Concerning the rapidity with which telephone connections were
secured in pioneer days, we have a statement made in 1887, by Mr. B.
E. Sunny, a man of exceptional ability, who was one of the first to
comprehend the true function of telephone service and who strove to
make his service the best that human effort and improved apparatus
could make it. Mr. Sunny said :

Chicago has tried the division of labor plan on three distinct types of
switchboard. On the first switchboard in the central office in about 1880, with
four hundred subscribers, we were able to make a connection in about five
minutes; on the second type of switchboard, which was the Gilliland, we were
able to make connection with five operators in about two minutes. On the
third type- of switchboard, which was the Western Electric pattern, but of
special make, we came mighty near not being able to make any connection at
all ; but after we had hammered away at it for a long time, we got the time
down to about two minutes and a half. We changed from that to our present
system of the unit of labor, and we make connections on an average of about
forty- five seconds. So far as possible we make two operators on all connec-
tions, local and trunk, do the work.

It is also interesting to note that in 1884 Mr. Sunny started a
school of instruction for telephone operators in Chicago. When an
applicant appeared she was advised to enter this school and receive
free instruction, and about one in four of the students were found
competent to enter the regular service. When full, the class was com-
posed of ten students. The teacher in charge was a former public
school teacher, who had also served four years as an operator, monitor,
chief operator, etc., under conditions that had enabled her to gain a
thorough knowledge of the duties of an operator. The school appa-
ratus consisted of three sections of switchboard and a dozen or more
telephones connected up at different points in the school-room. Calls
were sent in and connections made at the switchboards as nearly as
possible according to regular practice. Mr. Sunny found that this
method of training

educates the students in the matter of hearing and talking and handling the
cords and handling the cam-levers, so that when they sit down to actual work
they have nothing to overcome except the momentary nervousness. In the
old system we used to take a new-comer and put her on a section to answer
fifty subscribers, and we used to depend upon the subscribers to educate the
operator and make her competent to fill that position.

DENATURED ALCOHOL ' 243

DENATURED ALCOHOL

By Professor S. LAWRENCE BIGELOW

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

TT7 IDESPEEAD interest was aroused by the passage, last June,
* » of an act of congress permitting the manufacture and sale
of alcohol tax-free after January 1, 1907, provided it be rendered
unfit to drink by the addition of substances imparting to it a repulsive
odor and taste. Such alcohol is known as denaturalized, denaturized,
or denatured alcohol, and the substances added are called denaturiz-
ing or denaturing agents, or more simply, denaturants. These are
barbarous terms, almost as repulsive as the substances themselves.
It is only fair to add that neither Professor Matthews nor President
Roosevelt is responsible for these dislocations of our language. They
are literal translations from German and French equivalents. True
to its resolutions of reform, our government has adopted the simplest
of these terms and recent publications refer to denatured alcohol and
denaturants.

The cause of the general interest in the subject is twofold. Each
individual in the community has reason to think that he may perhaps
derive some benefit from this bill ; that he will be able to use denatured
alcohol in a way to increase his comforts or to diminish his running
expenses. A smaller number see in the new article of commerce possi-
bilities of profitable occupation or of profitable investment. It is my
purpose to consider certain facts regarding denatured alcohol which
have a bearing upon these expectations.

Alcohol, to the chemist, is a class name for a large number of
different compounds, all of which have certain definite characteristics
in common. The proper name for ' ordinary alcohol/ sometimes
called ' grain ' alcohol, or ' spirits of wine,' constituting between 40 per
cent, and 55 per cent, of the volume of whiskey, brandy and the other
so-called spirituous liquors, 8 per cent, to 25 per cent, of the volume
of wines, 3 per cent, to 8 per cent, of the volume of beers and ales, is
ethyl alcohol. It contains only the elements carbon, hydrogen and
oxygen. Its chemical formula is C2H5OH and it is the only ' alcohol '
which can be taken as a beverage, all others being much more poison-
ous. For instance, wood alcohol, the correct name for which is methyl
alcohol, a substance about which we shall have frequent occasion to
speak as it is to be one of the denaturants, is closely related to ethyl
alcohol, containing the same elements only in slightly different pro-

244 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

portions. This is clearly shown by its chemical formula, CH3OH.
But it is a dangerous poison, and numerous cases are on record of
deaths due to its being mistaken for ethyl alcohol. This mistake
occurs easily. A man asked a druggist for a bottle of good alcohol.
The druggist understood him to say wood alcohol. The customer
took his purchase home, drank it and died. Moreover, there is some-
thing particularly horrible about the action of wood alcohol. Numer-
ous instances are on record proving that the substance has a specific
effect on the optic nerve. After complete recovery from dangerous
doses of methyl alcohol, in the course of a few days, patients have
become totally blind. It is desirable that these facts should be as
widely known as possible, since denatured alcohol is required by law
to contain 10 per cent, of this poison.

It is not too much to say that if we arrange all the liquids known
to us in the order of their general usefulness, water, which heads the
list of course, will be followed immediately by ethyl alcohol. Ethyl
alcohol is colorless and of an agreeable odor. It is an admirable clean-
ing agent, and a good antiseptic and disinfectant as well. It is an
ideal source of heat and power and is capable of being developed
into an ideal source of light. Ideal, because the products of its com-
bustion, carbon dioxide and water, both of which are normally present
in the air, are quite odorless and are harmless; ideal because, evapo-
rating quickly and completely if spilled, it is much cleaner than any
oil. It is an indispensable solvent in many chemical industries and is
the raw material from which important substances, such as acetic
acid (vinegar), the anesthetics ethyl ether and chloroform, the anti-
septic iodoform, and many other substances are made. It is the cheap-
est and easiest of all the alcohols to manufacture.

Truly, it is unfortunate that to this list of advantages must be
added the fact that it is drinkable, for this last property is made to
justify so many restrictions that its application to these useful pur-
poses is badly hampered. Alcoholic beverages are generally acknowl-
edged to be unnecessary luxuries; therefore, by common consent, they
are heavily taxed in every civilized country. A quantity of alcohol
costing about 11 cents to make, namely, a ' proof ' or ' tax ' gallon,
pays an internal revenue tax of $1.10. The ' proof or ftax' gallon
contains about 50 per cent, by volume of ethyl alcohol, and about
50 per cent, water. The law reads in such a way that if the alcohol
happens to be stronger, or above ' proof ' as it is called, the number
of gallons of ' proof ' spirit which could be made from it is calculated
and the tax is paid on this computed quantity. But, on the other
hand, if the alcohol be weaker, i. e., below ' proof/ it is taxed as if it
were 'proof/

This term ' proof spirit ' had a somewhat curious origin which is

DENATURED ALCOHOL 245

at the same time illustrative of the absurdly unscientific nature of
many of our commercial units of measurement. Formerly, in Eng-
land, a little pile of gunpowder was made and the ' spirit ' to be tested
was poured over this and lighted. If the burning alcohol, before going
out, set fire to the powder it was said to be above proof; if it went
out without igniting the powder, it was said to be below proof.
Thus ' proof spirit ' was defined as the most dilute alcohol which would
set fire to gunpowder under these conditions. The ridiculous inac-
curacy of such a test is sufficiently apparent. The British parliament
and our congress both passed laws defining ' proof ' in terms of specific
gravity.1 The alcohol which we buy for use in alcohol lamps or for

1 " ' Proof spirit ' . . . was defined by act of Parliament to be sueb tbat at
51° F. (10° C.) thirteen volumes shall weigh the same as twelve volumes of dis-
tilled water. The 'proof spirit' so made will have a specific gravity of 0.91984
at 15.5° C. (60° F.) and contain, according to Townes, 49.24 per cent, by weight
of alcohol and 50.76 per cent, of water. Spirits weaker than proof are described
as U. P. (under proof), stronger than proof as 0. P. (over proof) ; thus a spirit
of fifty U. P. means fifty water and fifty proof spirit, while fifty O. P. means
that the alcohol is of such strength that to every one hundred of the spirit fifty
of water would have to be added to reduce it to proof strength." — ' Handbook
of Industrial Organic Chemistry,' by S. P. Sadler, p. 217.

"Proof spirit is alcohol of such a strength that 13 gallons of the spirit have
the same weight as 12 gallons of distilled water at 10° C. Proof spirit contains
49.24 per cent, of absolute alcohol by weight." — ' Outlines of Industrial Chem-
istry,' Thorpe, p. 409.

In the Zeitschrift fur angewandte Chemie, Vol. I. (1888), p. 29, may be
found tables for the conversion of per cents, over and per cents, under proof
into per cent, of alcohol by volume. According to these, for instance,
1 per cent, over proof equals 57.8 per cent, alcohol by volume
70 per cent, over proof equals 97.3 per cent, alcohol by volume
that is, 100 per cent., or absolute alcohol, beyond which we can not go, corre-
sponds to a little less than 75 over proof. According to these tables again,
1 per cent, under proof equals 56.6 per cent, alcohol by volume
70 per cent, under proof equals 17.2 per cent, alcohol by volume
that is, pure water, containing no alcohol, is 100 below proof. The above figures
show ' proof spirit ' as containing about 57.2 per cent, alcohol by volume.

The above definitions apply in England, but not in the United States. Sec-
tion 3,249 of the Internal Revenue Laws in force January 1, 1900 (page 144)
reads : " Proof spirit shall be held to be that alcoholic liquor which contains
one half its volume of alcohol of a specific gravity of seven thousand nine hun-
dred and thirty-nine ten thousandths (0.7939) at sixty degrees Fahrenheit."

The following dialogue appears in the hearings before the Committee on
Ways and Means, February-March, 1906, on page 121 :

Mr. Boutell : " In that connection will you kindly explain the use of the
word ' proof ' in connection with alcohol ? Absolute alcohol would be what
proof?"

Professor Wiley : " It would be 200. That is, a commercial gallon of pure
alcohol would be 200 proof."

Mr. Boutell : " And a gallon of it on which a tax of a dollar and ten cents
is levied is 100 proof? "

246 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

rub-downs is much stronger, averaging 85 per cent, or 90 per cent.
Investigations carried out in Germany have demonstrated that the best
strength for general, miscellaneous uses is 95 per cent, and that is the
strength which we, as consumers, should insist upon.

It is readily figured out that such alcohol at the present time must
pay a tax of $2.08 the measured gallon. The wholesale price is in the
neighborhood of $2.50 per gallon, of which we may estimate the gov-
ernment gets $2.08, the distilleries 42 cents.

The tax on alcohol yields a not inconsiderable fraction of the
whole revenue of the federal government. According to the ( Statis-
tical Abstract ' for 1904, published by the government, the Internal
Eevenue collections were as follows :

Year From Spirituous From Fermented Totals

Liquors. Liquors.

1900 $109,868,817 $73,550,755 $183,419,572

1901 116,027,980 75,669,908 191,697,888

1902 121,138,013 71,988,902 192,126,915

1903 131,953,472 47,547,8562 179,501,328

1904 135,810,015 49,083,458 184,893,473

The federal government has no disciplinary motive in this heavy
tax; that function is performed by the individual states and cities un-
der the familiar name of local option. The government merely takes
advantage of the strong feelings of so many individuals against the
use of alcoholic beverages at all to levy a tremendous tax. It is an
interesting fact in this connection that no increase in the tax has ever
produced an appreciable diminution in the amount consumed in this
or in any other country.

The demands of manufacturers and others desiring to utilize
alcohol for economic purposes were recognized long ago by other gov-
ernments, and the efforts to satisfy these legitimate demands, while at

Professor Wiley: "Yes; it is called 'proof simply. That means 100
proof."

Mr. Boutell : " It means one half of absolute alcohol and one half of H20 ? "

Professor Wiley: "Yes, that is what it means. This cologne spirit is about
96 per cent., and the rest of it is water. . . . This would be then 192 proof, or
92 above proof, as it is very commonly expressed. It is a purely arbitrary
method of statement, fixed for the convenience of our excise office. When they
say liquor is ' proof,' it means that it is one half ethyl alcohol and one half
something else."

On page 154 of the same hearings:

Mr. Stevens: "... ordinary alcohol is 188 proof. You divide that by two
and it gives you 94. You divide the proof by 2 and it gives you the percentage."

As Thorpe's and Sadler's books are so widely used as texts and as refer-
ences, it is safe to assume that there is a little confusion as to the meaning of
this term ' proof.' It should be made clear that there is this difference between
the English and the American definitions.

' The war tax was removed from beer.

DENATURED ALCOHOL 247

the same time safeguarding the revenues, resulted in this ingenious
scheme of ' denaturing.' We are fifteen or twenty years behind Ger-
many, France3 and practically all other civilized countries with our
recent measure. It is very evident, then, that there is nothing new
about denatured alcohol. Our tardiness brings one advantage, how-
ever; we may profit by the experience of others. Some of this experi-
ence and some of the more important known facts may be considered
conveniently under the three heads : the manufacture of alcohol ; de-
naturants; and uses of denatured alcohol.

The Manufacture of Alcohol

The fact that alcohol results from the fermentation of sugar by
means of yeast is well known. Cane or beet sugar, the chemical name
for which is sucrose, is first broken up into a mixture of glucose and
fructose. This mixture is known as invert-sugar, referring to optical
properties which it would take too long to describe. This ' inversion '
is produced by a substance called invertase present in the yeast. It
may also be accomplished by the action of dilute acids. The glucose
and fructose then undergo fermentation, a splitting up into ethyl alco-
hol and carbon dioxide, as a result of the growth of the yeast plant.
Pasteur's long and brilliant investigations led him to believe that fer-
mentation could never occur except when accompanying some kind of
multiplication of cells, either yeast cells or bacteria, i. e., some form
of living protoplasm, and that it was thus a physiological phenomenon.
By means of great pressures, Buchner, however, succeeded in extract-
ing from yeast a liquid which contained no cells and no living proto-
plasm and yet produced fermentation. The German name for this
liquid is Presssaft, which may be translated into ' press-fluid.' The
fermentation is produced by a substance, which Buchner called zymase,
in solution in this ( press-fluid.' Since then numerous other similar
substances have been discovered which produce chemical changes, for-
merly supposed to occur only in conjunction with life processes.
These substances, the inorganic or ' cell-less ' ferments, of which inver-
tase and zymase are typical, are known as enzymes. We really know
very little about these enzymes or how they work, but they are intensely
interesting and many of the ablest scientists of the times are engaged
in their study.

Glucose and fructose are but two of a large number of chemically
similar bodies which can be obtained from a great variety of agricul-
tural products such as corn, rye, grains of all kinds, apples, grapes
and fruits of all kinds, from Irish potatoes and from sweet potatoes,
in short, from anything containing either starch or sugar. A list of

3 In France, the first law relieving from taxes alcohol intended for industrial
purposes was passed in 1814.

248 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the names given to these substances would be superfluous; in the lan-
guage of chemistry they are all sugars, though they are not all sweet.
Differing in minor particulars, they all have certain properties in com-
mon, and the most characteristic of these common properties is that
they each and all may be fermented and will yield ethyl alcohol as one
of the products of the fermentation.

The methods for conducting the fermentation on an industrial
scale have been carefully worked out, but it is not the intention to enter
here into the details of that phase of the subject.4

Ethyl alcohol boils at a lower temperature than water, consequently
when the dilute alcohol obtained by fermentation is subject to distilla-
tion the distillate contains more alcohol and less water than the orig-
inal liquid. When the alcohol has been concentrated by distillation to
about 40 per cent, or 50 per cent, of the total volume of liquid we have
one of the so-called spirituous liquors — brandy, whiskey, gin or rum.
These liquors owe their individual aromas and flavors to relatively
insignificant traces of essential oils and organic esters derived from
the particular material which was fermented. Just after they are
made they also contain small quantities of distinctly deleterious sub-
stances (alcohols other than ethyl alcohol), which taken together are
often referred to as fusel oil. These other alcohols should be removed
before the liquor is put on the market. The old-fashioned way of
removing them was to allow the crude liquor to remain for some years
in oaken casks; the wood of the casks gradually absorbed some of the
injurious ingredients, while others were oxidized by the action of the
air and some coloring matter was extracted from the wood. Such a
time-consuming process is not in harmony with modern methods, so
we have numerous chemical processes for removing the undesirable con-
stituents. We can impart what color we like with more or less burnt
sugar and thus artificially ' age ' our spirituous liquors and wines in
short order. The number of patents allowed upon processes of this
character is surprisingly large. A spirituous liquor is thus cheap stuff
at the best, not worth intrinsically a tenth, often not a hundredth, part
of its retail price.

The manufacture of whiskey, rum and the like, then, is really a
step in the process of the manufacture of ethyl alcohol for commercial
use. The alcohol, still too dilute, is subjected to another distillation;
it is ' rectified.' This rectification is carried out with the assistance
of an ingenious but simple contrivance with the somewhat pompous
name of dephlegmator. A dephlegmator consists essentially of a
series of chambers, one above the other, each succeeding chamber a

4 For particulars see any one of the numerous excellent texts on the subject.
Among the best are, ' Handbuch der Spiritusfabrikation,' by M. Maercker, eighth
edition, and ' Practical Treatise on the Distillation and Rectification of Alcohol,'
by W. T. Brannt.

DENATURED ALCOHOL 249

little lower in temperature than the one beneath it. The alcohol vapor
and water vapor from the still beneath pass through this dephlegmator,
and it is readily seen that much of the water and some of the alcohol
must condense in it and trickle back into the still. Inasmuch as alco-
hol condenses at a lower temperature than water it has the better
chance to pass clear through, and into the condenser and receiver.
Many modifications of this machine are on the market and they are
all efficient. It is an easy matter, with it, to obtain 80 per cent, to 90
per cent, alcohol, and not difficult to obtain 95 per cent, alcohol. The
last four or five per cent, of water clings hard to the alcohol and can
not be removed by distillation alone. If it is desired to make yet
purer alcohol, some substance such as lime, which combines eagerly
with water, must be added to hold the water back, and then practically
pure alcohol may be distilled off. Pure alcohol containing no water
(100 per cent.) is known as absolute alcohol. But such pure alcohol
is needed only for a few special chemical processes ; there is no general
demand for anything better than 95 per cent. Indeed, absolute alco-
hol has what may be called an avidity for water; it is hygroscopic, and
if left in an open bottle will soon collect moisture out of the air and
dilute itself.

It is evident that any distillery in the country — and there are about
one thousand of them producing upwards of one hundred and fifty
millions of ' tax gallons ' a year — can increase its output to correspond
to the demand which may spring up. The permission to market the
product free of tax, if denatured, will then, in the first instance, merely
furnish another outlet for the products of these distilleries. A new
factory will find itself immediately in competition with the old estab-
lished plants.

The question next arises, are there any methods of making alcohol
other than those by which spirituous liquors are made? In the sense
that spirituous liquors are essentially nothing but more or less dilute
alcohol such other methods are obviously impossible. But there are
methods starting with very different raw materials.

Berthelot, the French chemist, long ago showed how ethyl alcohol
might be made synthetically from inorganic materials. The destruc-
tive distillation of coal gives us coal gas, and one of the constituents
of this is ethylene. This ethylene will dissolve in sulphuric acid form-
ing ethyl-sulphuric acid. If we add water and distil, ethyl alcohol is
given off and collects in the receiver, while the sulphuric acid may be
recovered in its original condition. At the present time we can start
even farther back than Berthelot's starting point. A mixture of lime
and charcoal heated in an electric furnace will give us calcium carbide.
This calcium carbide, with water, will give us acetylene, and the acety-
lene will combine with hydrogen to form ethylene. Then the rest of

250 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the process follows the outline laid down by Berthelot. This amounts
to making our alcohol out of charcoal and water, and electrical energy
derived from water power, with the assistance of some chemical re-
agents, which can be recovered and used over again. The process is
simple and practical, but it costs considerably more to make alcohol
this way than by fermentation, therefore there is no likelihood that
installations on this plan will be put into operation yet awhile.

Now and then articles appear in the newspapers with such titles as
' Alcohol from Sawdust,' or ' Alcohol from Old Newspapers/ titles
calculated to rouse the interest (perhaps the cupidity also) of readers,
and conveying the impression that here at last is a new and brilliant
discovery. There is nothing very new about it. Alcohol was first
made from wood about one hundred years ago, and chemists have
turned their attention sporadically to improving the methods ever
since.

In round numbers 50 per cent, of the weight of wood is cellulose,
a substance containing the same elements, in the same proportions by
weight, as starch. Starch, under the influence of a suitable enzyme, or
of a dilute acid, can be converted to fermentable sugar; and so can
cellulose, although with greater difficulty and much less completely.
Newspapers are made from wood pulp and are almost wholly cellulose.
Many other things are largely cellulose, for instance, corn stalks, linen,
hemp, flax, cotton (cotton wool is practically pure cellulose). From
any of these ethyl alcohol may be made, indeed, Melsen of Brussels,
as long ago as 1855, appears to have amused himself by seeing how
long a list of substances he could compile from which he could say he
had made ethyl alcohol.5 His list included, besides those materials
already mentioned, such things as dead leaves, stubble, straw, chaff,
sweepings from malt, carrot tops, sponges, even birds' nests !

A complete history of all the partial successes would be tedious
to any but professional chemists. The difficulty has always been, and
still is, that only a small percentage of the cellulose present can be
converted into fermentable sugar. This means that large quantities
of material must be handled, large amounts of acids must be used,
a great deal of fuel must be burned in heating these large quantities,
and, after all, a relatively small amount of alcohol is obtained. If
a weight of alcohol equal to 7 per cent, of the weight of the wood
is secured, the yield must be considered good. Even this sounds
promising because wood is cheap. But it should be understood that
it is not the cost of the raw material which constitutes the obstacle;
it is the cost of treatment.

Simonsen's and Classen's processes may be taken as illustrative
of the best present methods for making ethyl alcohol from wood.
They are being tried on a commercial scale in Germany.

5 See Dingler's Polytechnisches Journal, Vol. 138, p. 426, 1856.

DENATURED ALCOHOL 251

A large cylindrical vessel, of a capacity somewhat over 1,600 gal-
lons, lined with lead which is not attacked by dilute sulphuric acid,
is mounted in such a way that it may be revolved to agitate the con-
tents. It is strongly built to resist considerable pressures. Such an
instrument, whether large or small, intended for carrying out re-
actions under the combined influence of heat and pressure, is called
an autoclave.

In Simonsen's process the autoclave is charged with 100 kilo-
grams (220 lbs.) of sawdust and between 300 and 500 kilograms of
dilute sulphuric acid (0.5 per cent. acid). Steam is blown in through
openings in the axles until the whole has reached a temperature of
100° Centigrade (212° Fahr.), when the autoclave is closed. Then
it is heated to about 175° Centigrade, the pressure in the interior
simultaneously rising to about 135 lbs. per square inch. These con-
ditions are maintained for about half an hour, while the contents
are thoroughly stirred by rotation. The autoclave is then opened
and the liquid is filtered off from the solid residue. A portion of the
cellulose, under the influence of the acid, the heat and the pressure,
has been converted to glucose, fermentable sugars, which are soluble
and so are contained in the liquid, the filtrate. The solid residue is
made up into briquettes for fuel. The acid in the filtrate is almost
neutralized with lime (it is desirable to leave it feebly acid), and this
necessitates another filtration, for the neutralization results in the
formation of a solid precipitate of calcium sulphate which must
be removed. Yeast, and a small amount of nutrient material for the
yeast, are then added, and the whole is maintained at a temperature
of 25° Centigrade for from three to five days. At the end of this
time the fermentation is complete. The first distillation yields a
15 per cent, alcohol and a second distillation brings the concentration
of the alcohol up to about 75 per cent.

Pine and fir wood give about the same quantities of alcohol, birch is
better for the purpose. In a general way hard woods appear to give
better results than soft woods. Seven liters of absolute alcohol from
100 kilograms of sawdust containing 20 per cent, of moisture must
be considered a satisfactory yield.

Simonsen estimates that he can make 100 liters of absolute alcohol
for 5.86 Marks, that is, at a cost of about 5% cents a gallon. If
this estimate were strictly correct, the process could compete with
those based on the direct fermentation of agricultural produce; if
it were strictly correct, it is reasonable to suppose that there would be
more factories making alcohol from wood than there are.

Classen's process is similar to Simonsen's, but the chemistry of it
appears to be more economical. Classen runs sulphur dioxide gas
(which can be easily and cheaply obtained in any of the numerous

252 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

localities where there are deposits of iron pyrites) into the autoclave.
The sulphur dioxide gas, under pressure, penetrates the pores of
the wood, and uniting with the moisture there forms sulphurous acid,
which serves the purpose of the more expensive sulphuric acid in
Simonsen's process. When the autoclave is opened the excess of sul-
phurous acid gas is easily driven off and may be used on a fresh por-
tion of wood. Furthermore, as less acid is left, less lime is required
for the neutralization which must precede the fermentation. The
claim is made that 25 gallons of absolute alcohol have been made from
one long ton of sawdust by Classen's process.

Numerous modifications have been suggested, tried and patented,
but this is not the place to enter upon a detailed account of these re-
finements. Perhaps the most interesting is the claim made by Gentzen
and Eoth in their patent that the addition of ozone, while the wood
is being acted upon by acids and is under pressure, materially in-
creases the amount of cellulose converted into dextrose, glucose and
fermentable sugars.

The methods may be said to be on the verge of financial success
and some small change or addition may any day convert a moderately
profitable process into a brilliant success. Problems for physical
chemists abound in these processes. We need to know exactly the
most favorable concentration of acid, the best temperatures and pres-
sures to be applied and the proper length of time during which the
acid, heat and pressure should be allowed to act. Some work has been
done on these questions and more is being done. For instance, it has
been proved that prolonged action of the acid is harmful, for fer-
mentable sugars which are formed early are later destroyed. It is
therefore necessary to interrupt the process at the right time. Such
experiments cost money and the time of highly educated men, and no
one would dare to say positively that they would result in the discovery
of a bonanza. Unfortunately, our manufacturers do not yet realize
of what value truly scientific, highly trained, high-priced men would
be to them, while the German manufacturers do, and so we may ex-
pect these, and almost all other such experiments, to be carried out,
and the results to be obtained, in Germany. We shall get them after
they have passed through the patent office and shall, very likely, soon
be making large quantities of ethyl alcohol from wood, paying royalties
to Germans for the privilege.

The suggestion has been made that a process for the manufacture
of alcohol might be run profitably in conjunction with wood-pulp paper
mills. There does not appear to be the least chance of utilizing the
waste from the end of the sulphite process because it contains little
or nothing fermentable. It has already been subjected for a long while
to the action of sulphurous acid and the fermentable sugars, pro-

DENATURED ALCOHOL 253

duced by a brief action of sulphurous acid on cellulose, have been de-
stroyed again by the prolongation of the action.

But, in the manufacture of the pulp, the wood chips are often given
a preliminary treatment to soften and partially disintegrate them.
It seems perfectly possible that a liquor might be obtained at this
stage of the manufacture which could be worked up into alcohol.

Denaturants

The properties which an ideal denaturant should have may be
summed up under five heads and they are as follows:

1. It must render the alcohol undrinkable.

2. It must be cheap, otherwise the advantages of ' free ' alcohol are
lost.

3. It must be 'separable from the alcohol only with difficulty and
at considerable cost.

It seems to the writer that government officials show a tendency
to be more cautious than necessary regarding this feature of denaturing
agents. Such a thing as a denaturant which a chemist could not re-
move probably does not exist, and so it is wholly a question of the
degree of difficulty, and the cost, of the purification. If this difficulty
and cost be never so little more than those involved in the manu-
facture of new alcohol from raw materials, it should be considered
as fulfilling the requirements. Dishonest individuals, bent on swin-
dling the government out of its revenues, would set up illicit stills
rather than attempt to ' renature ' denatured alcohol. But the gov-
ernment demands are much in excess of this standard.

4. It must be readily detected, in order that revenue officers may
determine with ease whether a given liquid contains denatured alcohol
or not.

5. It must not interfere with the use of the alcohol for those
purposes permitted by law.

It is by no means easy to find substances fulfilling all these re-
quirements; in fact, although the list of possibilities has been gone
over and over again by the ablest living chemists for a matter of
twenty years or more, the subject is by no means closed. All the
denaturants tried and proposed are unsatisfactory in one way or
another, and the governments of Bussia, France and Germany offer
prizes ranging from $4,000 to $20,000 for any denaturant which can
be proved to be a distinct improvement over those in use.

Wood spirit, by which is meant, as has already been said, a crude
methyl alcohol containing many impurities, notably in the neighbor-
hood of 25 per cent, of acetone, obtained as one of the products of
the dry distillation of wood, is one of the most satisfactory denaturing
agents. It is difficult to remove from ethyl alcohol, it is readily de-

254 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tected and it is fairly cheap. Alcohol, denatured by the addition of
10 per cent, of wood spirit and nothing else, has been on the market in
England for years under the name of 'methylated spirit.' On the
other hand, it does not impart to the alcohol such a repulsive odor
and taste but what some perverts drink it if nothing else alcoholic
is obtainable. According to the Lancet and other English papers,
this terribly injurious habit has already reached alarming proportions
and is on the increase. A penny will buy in 'methylated spirits' as
much alcohol as is contained in a glass of whiskey.

One of the strong arguments brought forward in support of the
1 free alcohol ' measure was that methyl alcohol had been substituted
in numerous industries where ethyl alcohol would have been better,
and that the health of those obliged to work constantly in an atmos-
phere laden with the vapor of methyl alcohol was seriously impaired.
The continuous inhalation of the vapor causes the same symptoms, in a
milder degree, as those following the drinking of the alcohol, notably
affections of the eyes. Those whose business it is to denature alcohol
with wood spirits unavoidably labor under these disadvantages, but
denatured alcohol containing 10 per cent, of the wood spirit will cause
troubles of this character only under exceptional circumstances.

To make denatured alcohol yet less potable, German law requires
the addition of a second substance, pyridine. The danger can not be
wholly eliminated, as there have always been found at least a few so
degenerate as to drink the most disgusting mixtures if only they con-
tain alcohol. The so-called pyridine bases are obtained from the dis-
tillation of bones and also from tar. They constitute a somewhat oily
liquid, soluble in both alcohol and in water, and they have such an
utterly repulsive odor and taste that the addition of small quantities
permits of the material reduction in the amount of ' wood spirit ' used
in denaturing. In Germany, alcohol is denatured by the addition
of 2 per cent, of wood spirit and % of 1 per cent, of these pyridine
bases.

But these pyridine bases have serious disadvantages also. They are
volatile, and when denatured alcohol containing them is burnt in a
spirit lamp the penetrating and highly unpleasant odor is perceptible
in the room. They are combustible and should be wholly consumed,
but when the lamp is blown out the parts about the wick remain warm
and this heat volatilizes a portion of the liquid. If much of the vapor
of pyridine be breathed it produces a severe headache, the same sort of
seemingly unendurable pain which is produced by inhaling the vapor
of nitro-glycerine. The injurious effect of pyridine on the health of
those employed in denaturing alcohol has been the subject of discus-
sions in the German Eeichstag. The government of Germany permits
the addition of small quantities of lavender oil to partially disguise

DENATURED ALCOHOL 255

the detestable odor, and recently has permitted a reduction in the re-
quired amount of pyridine bases, substituting for it some benzine.0
The experience of Germany indicates that pyridine, in spite of its dis-
advantages, is, on the whole, the best general denaturant known.

In Austria-Hungary the standard denaturant is practically the
same as in Germany. In France it is much the same as in England —
to 100 liters of alcohol are added 10 liters of wood spirit which must
contain 25 per cent, of acetone and certain other impurities. Besides
this, other substances must be added, the nature of the second substance
varying according to the destination of the product. For instance, if
the alcohol is to be used for heating, the addition must be half a liter
of ' benzine ' ; if it is to be used for lighting, four per cent, of resin
must be added.

We are to have our choice between the methods of France and of
Germany. According to Regulations USTo. 30 of the United States
Internal Eevenue and to circulars Nos. 680 and 686 issued by the
Treasury Department, alcohol may be denatured by adding to each
hundred liters of alcohol of not less than 180° proof, ten liters of
wood spirits and half a liter of benzine, or by adding to that quantity
of the alcohol two liters of wood spirit and half a liter of pyridine
bases. The wood spirit, benzine and pyridine bases, with which the
denaturing is to be done, must be ' approved.' " The methyl alcohol
submitted must be partially purified wood alcohol obtained by the de-
structive distillation of wood." " It must contain not more than 25
or less than 15 grams per 100 c.c. of acetone and other substances
estimated as acetone." ..." The benzine submitted for approval
must be a hydrocarbon product derived either from petroleum or coal
tar." " It must be of such character as to impart a decided odor to
ethyl alcohol when mixt [sic] with it in the proportion of one half

8 This word benzine is sadly overworked. Spelled with an e, benzene, it is
the correct scientific name for a definite chemical compound of the composition
represented by the formula C6H8. Spelled with an i, benzine or benzin, it is often
used to mean benzene, toluene, xylene, mesitylene, or several other things obtained
from the distillation of coal, or a mixture of any two or more of these things.
More frequently it means any one of the score of substances obtained in the dis-
tillation of crude American petroleum before the temperature is high enough to
drive off what we call kerosene. That is to say, it may mean rhigolene, cymogene,
gasolene, or naphtha, petroleum-ether or ligroin, or a mixture of these. As these
are themselves mixtures, the confusion is worse confounded. Many, if not most
chemists, in an effort to avoid misunderstandings, adopted the German word
benzol to indicate that definite and important compound OeH6, but the relief was
for but a little while. Now benzol, too, has begun to be used in certain indus-
tries, as if it were synonymous with benzine or benzene. When one of these
three words is used it is impossible to tell immediately what is meant; the
meaning may be deducible later from the context, frequently it is not, as the
chances are almost even that the speaker himself does not know. It covers a
multitude of inaccuracies; perhaps that is why the word is so popular.

256 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

of one part by volume." The rest of the tests which must be applied
and to which the denaturants must conform are not of general interest.

As the presence of denaturing agents prevents the use of the alco-
hol in numerous processes, other countries have long lists of substances
used to partially denature alcohol destined for use in particular indus-
tries, partially protecting it, as it were, in transit from the factory in
which it is made to that in which it is consumed. For instance, in
France, alcohol intended for use in the manufacture of aniline dyes
may be denatured by adding to 50 liters of the alcohol 50 liters of
nitro-benzene or of nitro-toluene, and 10 grams of sodium hydroxide
dissolved in 20 liters of alcohol. For varnishes, the product put on
the market must contain 75 grams of resin per liter. There are in all
about fifty different processes allowed for partial denaturing for as
many special purposes. In Germany, for the manufacture of polish,
alcohol may be denatured with one half of one per cent, of turpentine ;
for the manufacture of varnish, with 20 per cent, of a solution of one
part shellac in two parts of alcohol; for the manufacture of the anes-
thetic, ethyl ether, and numerous other medicinal substances, with 10
per cent, of ethyl ether; for the manufacture of acetic acid, or vinegar,
with 6 per cent, or 8 per cent, of acetic acid; for the manufacture of
smokeless powders, 1 per cent, of camphor; and so on through a list
as long as that in France.

Partially denatured alcohol never wholly leaves the watchful care
of the guardians of the law. No list of partial denaturants permissible
in this country has been determined upon. Interested parties are in-
vited to make their suggestions and requests and these will be consid-
ered by the commissioner of internal revenue.

Uses of Denatured Alcohol

Every one knows from actual experience how clean and convenient
spirit lamps are. There is never any soot nor smelly oil to be cleaned
up, lamp chimneys remain clear and transparent and wicks require no
trimming. The products of the combustion of ethyl alcohol are water
and carbon dioxide, absolutely odorless and as harmless as any prod-
ucts of combustion can possibly be. It is much less inflammable than
gasoline, and therefore safer. Water thrown on burning alcohol will
immediately extinguish the fire, as alcohol is soluble in water in all
proportions, while water thrown on burning oil or gasoline only makes
matters worse. Oil and gasoline are lighter than water and are not
soluble in it, so they float on top and continue to burn; throwing on
water only spreads the fire.

Measured in terms of units of heat, calories, a given weight of ethyl
alcohol is about twice as effective as an equal weight of petroleum. Its
convenience, cleanliness, safety and adaptability to almost any sort of

DENATURED ALCOHOL 2 si

burner in almost any place, is such that it would undoubtedly be pre-
ferred to all other fuels for all purposes if it were not for the cost.

The presence of any denaturing agent robs it, to a greater or a less
extent, of some of its natural advantages. The odor of the denaturant
is apt to be detected either before, during or after combustion.

Denatured alcohol has been found to dissolve some metals, notably
brass. Of course the solvent effect is not rapid, but yet it is constantly
under way and necessitates repairs to metallic lamps. The metal dis-
solves as a salt which is left on the wick when the more volatile alcohol
burns, encrusting the wick and necessitating occasional cleaning or
trimming. This crust interferes with the efficiency of the lamp
whether it be used for heating or for light. But that is not the worst
feature of the solution of metals in the alcohol. The small quantities
of metal are in part volatilized and are deposited on any object which
is being heated. Platinum crucibles are quickly ruined by this action
and this alone is sufficient to absolutely prohibit the use of denatured
alcohol in chemical laboratories.

Some investigations have been made to determine which constitu-
ent of denatured alcohol is responsible for this solvent action. Neither
pure ethyl alcohol nor pure methyl alcohol nor pure pyridine, nor yet
pure ' benzine ' would dissolve metals. The most recent work appears
to fix the blame on small quantities of organic esters, formed during
fermentation and left in the alcohol itself, which of course is not so
carefully purified, if it is to be denatured, as if it were intended for
drinking purposes. This might appear to be a small detail, but is not,
for it affects the usefulness of denatured alcohol for heat, light and
power also. Anything corrosive in action could not be tolerated in the
cylinder of an engine any more than it could in contact with a pla-
tinum crucible in the chemical laboratory.

The efficiency of a gas engine is the greater the greater the com-
pression of the charge, the mixture of gas or vapor and air, before the
explosion. Compression can not be carried far with gasoline, for com-
pression, of course, heats gases, and gasoline catches fire so easily it is
apt to explode prematurely, i. e., while the piston head is traveling the
wrong way. The fact that alcohol is less readily inflammable makes
it possible to compress mixtures of air and alcohol much more without
danger of premature ignition. Therefore a larger percentage of the
power in alcohol can be utilized, it is more efficient. In parallel ex-
periments Diesel obtained 17.6 per cent, of the power in kerosene as
mechanical energy, 20.5 per cent, of the power in gasoline, and 31.7
per cent, of the power in ethyl alcohol. Those competent to judge say
it will not be difficult to obtain 40 per cent, of the power in alcohol as
mechanical work done. But, on the other hand, there is less power in
alcohol than there is in the petroleum products, weight for weight, as

VOL. lxx. — 17

258 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

is shown by the relative heats of combustion to which reference has
already been made. So that, at the present time, it is about an even
thing between the two sources of power, weight for weight, with the
chances good that American ingenuity will develop an alcohol motor
superior to the gasoline motor.

Alcohol engines used abroad require a preliminary warming up
before they will start. They are sometimes started with gasoline, and
sometimes 25 per cent, of gasoline is added to the alcohol to cause it
to ignite more readily. This may militate against alcohol as a motive
power at the outset, but even now there are to be found in the current
literature descriptions of alcohol engines which will start even without
this brief preliminary warming.

Numerical data as to the consumption of alcohol per horse power
are abundant. On the average, in small motors, the consumption at
present may be taken at about one and a half pints of alcohol per
brake horse-power hour. Professor Lucke, of Columbia, commissioned
by the government, is now engaged upon a series of exhaustive tests
of alcohol motors, and his results will be interesting.

Alcohol burns with a non-luminous flame. There are two general
methods by which it may be made to furnish light. First, by adding
some liquid, like ' benzine,' to it, which causes the flame to become
luminous, and second, to utilize the heat to heat a mantle such as the
ordinary Auer von Welsbach gas mantle, to incandescence.

A mixture consisting of 65 per cent, to 85 per cent, denatured
alcohol and 35 per cent, to 15 per cent, of the distillate from coal tar,
boiling between 150° and 160° Centigrade (mainly mesitylene) is on
the market in Germany. It is known as e Plehn's fluid ' and burns
with a luminous flame.

Before the discovery of mineral oil a mixture of ethyl alcohol and
a very pure turpentine which was known as camphene7 was largely
used as an illuminant. It is of course possible to return to the cus-
toms of our grandfathers, but unfortunately the price of turpentine
has risen enormously in the meanwhile.

On the whole the other method, burning alcohol with a non-
luminous flame to heat a mantle on the plan of the Welsbach gaslight,
is probably to be preferred to methods for making the flame itself
luminous. It may be a little discouraging to prospective patentees in

7 Camphene is another word almost as ambiguous as ' benzine.' Camphene
is the correct scientific name for a definite chemical compound, a solid terpene
of the formula C10H16. Turpentine is a mixture of pinene,. also of the formula
C10H16, but a liquid, and other similar substances; purified, it contains a higher
per cent, of pinene, but is a mixture still, not pure pinene and certainly not
camphene. This appropriation of scientific names by dealers to imply a higher
degree of purity than actually exists in their wares is a constant source of con-
fusion and a real hindrance to the dissemination of accurate knowledge.

DENATURED ALCOHOL 259

this country to learn that lamps burning alcohol for light on this prin-
ciple are to be numbered literally by the hundreds in Germany to-day.
At a recent competition in that country for a prize for the best lamp
no less than 99 new designs were entered.

These lamps are efficient, the best using only 16 to 20 cubic centi-
meters of 95 per cent, alcohol for ten hefner candle power hours.
They are long lived, and will last without renewal of wick or mantle
much longer than the ordinary incandescent electric lamp lasts. Not
the least of their advantages in these days of domestic difficulties and
problems is their extreme cleanliness.

The questions as to the efficiencies of the denatured alcohol lamps
may be summed up by giving the results obtained by Professor Rous-
seau of Brussels. He has carried out many experiments and concludes
that denatured alcohol at 31 cents a gallon furnishes a slightly cheaper
light than kerosene at 15 cents a gallon.

But the subject is by no means closed. These alcohol lamps are
slow in getting started and a minute or a minute and a half elapses
after the match is applied before they are emitting their maximum
light. This is because a portion of the alcohol must be vaporized be-
fore the heat is great enough to raise the mantle to full incandescence.
This little detail is enough to condemn the lamps with many. That
their imperfections are fully recognized is demonstrated by the fact
that the government of France offers a prize of $10,000 for a device
to burn alcohol under exactly the same conditions under which petro-
leum may be burned for lighting purposes. Similar prizes are also
awaiting the fortunate inventor in Germany.

Questions involving the use of denatured alcohol in chemical indus-
tries must be omitted here, as anything like an adequate exposition
would require much space. They are questions of great magnitude,
involving perhaps the establishment of large and important manufac-
tories.

In these as in all the uses of alcohol the presence of any denaturing
agent whatever is at best a great nuisance. As was justly said by
Professor Erdmann, of Halle, in a discussion of the subject, "It is
most illogical and contrary to the most self-evident principles of econ-
omy to go to an expense in order to make a useful material less use-
ful." But, as a recent newspaper editorial said, " It is one of the
penalties which humanity as a whole must pay for the failings of a
minority."

Costs and Prices

The cost of ethyl alcohol to the manufacturer is a subject upon
which divergent opinions are held. It depends upon so many variable
factors that it is doubtless different for each manufacturer, and more-
over must differ from year to year if not from month to month. Cal-

26o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

culations as to what it should cost made from a given raw material
by a certain process are apt to be misleading. Simonsen's calculation
that a gallon of ethyl alcohol may be made from wood by his process
for 5% cents is an illustration of this. Results of experience on a
commercial scale are more trustworthy.

Ethyl alcohol made from the molasses from sugar cane in Cuba
and South American countries is sold at 10 cents a gallon. It takes
about three gallons of this molasses to make one gallon of 100 per
cent, alcohol. Assume that this molasses can be delivered at our sea-
ports for 3 cents a gallon, and it is safe to say that alcohol can be made
at those localities for 12 cents a gallon.

Evidence was taken by the Committee on Ways and Means before
the passage of the present law and brought out many interesting facts.
In a letter to the committee, Mr. M. N. Kline, referring to a distillery
in Peoria, Illinois, said that alcohol had been made there, from corn,
at a cost of 5.2 cents per proof gallon, and that the average cost during
the last ten years was 10.78 cents per proof gallon. The low value
corresponds to about 10 cents, the average value to about 20 cents
per gallon of 95 per cent, alcohol. Before the same committee Mr.
Batchelder estimated that with corn at 30 cents a bushel 90 per cent,
alcohol could be made for 11 to 12 cents a gallon; with corn at 40
cents a bushel, for about 16 cents a gallon. He thought a fair price
to distillers would be 20 cents a gallon. The concensus of opinion
appears to be that corn is the most promising source of alcohol in
this country, and the comparison, demonstrating the superiority of
corn over potatoes, from which the bulk of the alcohol to be denatured
is made in Germany, is carefully worked out by Dr. H. W. Wiley,
of the Bureau of Agriculture, in recent Farmers' Bulletins, Nos. 268
and 269. In these bulletins Dr. Wiley also calls attention to the
great possibilities of the cassava root as a raw material.

Secretary of Agriculture Wilson holds out very rosy prospects,
and thinks it not impossible that alcohol may be made for three
cents a gallon from corn cobs and from the juice of cornstalks at a
certain period of their growth. Let us hope that Secretary Wilson's
estimates may be justified by the events.

The retail price of 95 per cent, alcohol in Germany, converting
the values to our units of volume and money, has been as low as 15
cents and at the present time is about 30 cents a gallon. That these
prices do not always return satisfactory profits to the distillers is
evident from an article published by Dr. E. Parow in the Jahrbuch
des Vereins der Spiritusfabtikanten in Deutschland for 1906. After
giving figures showing that there has been an overproduction of po-
tatoes in Germany, because the increase in the demand for the prod-
ucts, alcohol and starch, has not kept pace with the increased crops,

DENATURED ALCOHOL 261

he continues: "The old distilleries are still capable of existence
to-day because they have moderately satisfactory established markets
for their products, but more than this because they have in great
measure already paid for themselves through sinking funds. New
distilleries have not got this support. Money invested in them may
be considered from the outset as lost. Hence one should advise as
strongly as possible against the construction of new distilleries." Such
pessimism as this is extreme, and German conditions are not Amer-
ican conditions. Still, at a time when we hear almost nothing but
highly favorable accounts, it is perhaps well to call attention to the
fact that there is another side to the question.

In the Farmers' Bulletins, already referred to, Dr. Wiley expresses
the opinion that alcohol will not be sold in this country for less than
40 cents a gallon. Judging from the evidence given before the com-
mittee of congress and some of the other facts recited above, this price
ought to furnish several eminently satisfactory profits. It may be hard
to find any distiller of spirits ready to say that 20 cents a gallon is
a fair price for his product, but it was, perhaps, easier to get close
estimates before the passage of the bill than it is now that the bill
has passed. It is to be hoped that the distillers will realize the danger
that they may kill the goose, even before it has begun to lay golden
eggs.

Much depends upon this question of price. So far as one can judge,
alcohol at 35 or 40 cents a gallon will be upon even terms with
kerosene at present prices for lighting purposes; even at a higher
price it will be preferred by many on account of its cleanliness and
safety. For the same reasons it may be preferred for running small
motors about farms, for threshing machines, etc. At 20 cents a
gallon it is about an even thing whether it will be chosen in prefer-
ence to gasoline for automobiles.

On the other hand, the price of petroleum products may be low-
ered if the competition of alcohol becomes strong. Mr. Young of
Michigan, in his speech opposing the passage of the bill,8 said petro-
leum products could be bought in New York for 7 and a fraction
cents a gallon by the barrel, and for 4 and a fraction cents a gallon
in bulk. He also estimated the production of petroleum products
in 1905 at the enormous quantity of 5,000 million gallons, and be-
lieves that the Standard Oil Company could sell for even less than
4 cents a gallon, if they thought it necessary, in order to retain
their markets, and to drive out alcohol. Such figures make the pros-
pects of denatured alcohol for heating and for power appear dubious.

In the hearings before the committee of Ways and Means it de-
veloped that in the northwest, for instance in North Dakota, petroleum

8 See Congressional Record, Vol. 40, part 6, pp. 5317-5334.

262 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

products are high, while corn is cheap. Here, at least, denatured
alcohol may be expected to displace gasoline. What applies to North
Dakota applies equally well to many semi-isolated agricultural dis-
tricts far from large markets, provided the alcohol can be made on
the spot.

Whether or not the denatured alcohol business will become the
property of a trust which will regulate prices is an interesting ques-
tion. If the Standard Oil Company looks with such perfect equa-
nimity at the advent of denatured alcohol upon the market, as Mr.
Young attributes to it, it is strange rumors should so constantly ap-
pear in the newspapers that the Standard Oil Company is buying up
the distilleries. These rumors might, indeed, be ascribed to the
agitation in favor of the bill before it was passed, but this does not
explain the persistence with which these rumors have been repeated
during the last few months, since the passage of the act. The ex-
perience of. other countries is worth noting in this connection. During
the last year or so an alcohol trust has been formed in Spain, with
headquarters at Madrid, and another was formed a year ago in Greece,
with headquarters at Pyrseus. Even one of the oldest of countries
appears willing in these days to learn the tricks of trade from one of
the youngest.

Any monopolization of the business of making alcohol would be
totally impossible if nature were allowed to take its course. The
process of manufacture is so simple and so readily carried out, and
on a small scale requires so small a capital outlay, that groups of
farmers could easily associate themselves and construct distilleries to
convert their surplus crops into alcohol. Nearly every county in an
agricultural district could have such a distillery and its products
would find a ready market at home for light and power. The Com-
missioner of Internal Eevenue, Mr. Yerkes, is reported to have been
asked, some months ago, if there was anything in the free alcohol bill
to prevent farmers and smaller merchants from so banding together;
whether any provision of the bill would result in throwing the new
industry into the hands of the distillers or of any other trust. He
replied, ' Nothing whatever.'

A study of the rules and regulations which were issued September
29, 1906, to govern the manufacture, denaturing and sale of denatured
alcohol, leads one to believe that he has supplied this omission; with-
out a doubt unwillingly, and through a sense of his duty as custodian
of the revenues, because Mr. Yerkes is well known to favor the ' free
alcohol measure,' but none the less effectually. Such a labyrinthine web
of restrictions and obstacles is surpassed in no other country or lan-
guage, and is equaled only by the present United States Government
restrictions on the distilling of spirituous liquors. It is more than

DENATURED ALCOHOL 263

likely to deter any from endeavoring to make and sell denatured alco-
hol, except those who have already devoted a large share of a studious
life to an endeavor to understand the present rules governing the dis-
tillation of spirituous liquors.

A few of these regulations are enough to give a fair idea of the
whole 152 which require sixty-two good-sized, closely-printed pages for
their statement. Any one desiring to denature alcohol must construct
a bonded warehouse on the distillery premises. The most minute
details of its construction are laid down, even to the make of locks used
for locking the doors and securing the faucets and openings of the
tanks. A room must be provided for an internal revenue officer whose
duties appear to be largely to sit in the room and keep the keys in his
pocket. " Not less than 300 wine gallons of alcohol can be withdrawn
at one time for denaturing purposes." The denaturants after being
approved must be kept locked in the bonded warehouse until used.
Exact instructions concerning the bookkeeping of the establishment
are given. The denaturants must be ' thoroly mixt ' [sic] with the
alcohol in the presence of a revenue officer. If no mistakes have been
made thus far (and any mistake involves a stoppage of the process,
the filling out of numerous legal blanks, and reference to an endless
chain of supervisors, inspectors, collectors, and chemists), the manu-
facturer may draw off his product ' thru ' his approved pipes and
locks into receptacles of not less than 5 gallons, nor more than 135
gallons capacity, " all of which receptacles must be painted light
green." Under no circumstances is a package containing denatured
alcohol to be of any other color. It is to be hoped we may not
be left too long in suspense as to the exact shade of green demanded
for this momentous purpose. " Upon each head of the package shall
be stenciled in red letters of not less than 114 inches in length by 1
inch in width, the words, ' denatured alcohol.' " Seven other items
of interest must be stenciled on the head, but probably through some
oversight, the size and color of these letters do not appear to be speci-
fied. Complete transcripts of records of the previous month must be
sworn to before the tenth of the next month. The form of affidavit
is given, nothing seems to be forgotten, even the colors of the inks with
which the records are to be written are prescribed.

Next follow regulations for the sale of denatured alcohol, if any
one ventures into the precarious business of making it, undaunted by
the legal pitfalls and penalties provided. ' Manufacturers of and deal-
ers in beverages of any kind ' are not permitted to keep nor store dena-
tured alcohol; they are in danger of the strong arm of the law if they
so much as have a light green cask with red letters on it in their pos-
session. Druggists are mercifully exempt from this prohibition.
Permits, which must be renewed each year, must be obtained before

264 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

any dealer can sell denatured alcohol. Apparently these permits cost
nothing beyond the trouble of getting them, the filling out of forms,
a few oaths, etc. Dealers must make monthly reports under oath of
purchase, sale and stock on hand. All premises and all books of dena-
tures and of all dealers in or users of denatured alcohol must be open
at all hours of the day and night to revenue agents and deputy col-
lectors.

There is, of course, an equally elaborate system of safeguards cover-
ing the manufacture and use of partially denatured alcohol. If, in
the course of a manufacturing process alcohol is used as a solvent and
is recovered, it can not be redistilled except in the presence of a rev-
enue agent. An almost overwhelming number of application forms,
directions and prohibitions apply to this redistilling of recovered alco-
hol also.

It does not seem too much to say that the present rules about ex-
plode all hopes that small factories can be established in rural districts
to convert an overproduction of potatoes, and the like, into fuel, a
source of light, or a readily transported and marketable product. It
does not seem too much to say that these rules inevitably throw the
new industry into the hands of established distilleries, i. e., into the
hands of the whiskey trust.

A Standard Oil expert is quoted as reporting that denatured alco-
hol is not now in a position to rival petroleum products, but that it
is a very favorable product to control. It is, indeed, a favorable prod-
uct to control. Made by the growth of plants utilizing carbon dioxide
and water from the atmosphere, it contains nothing but carbon, hydro-
gen and oxygen. All the rest of the plant may be returned to the soil,
which thus is not impoverished. It is the best method known to us
to-day to store the sun's energy. By its means the rotation of the
seasons can be made to give an inexhaustible supply of light, power
and heat. Some way should be found to safeguard our precious rev-
enue, and at the same time to leave this valuable agent for the progress
of civilization as free as the air, sunshine and rain from which it is
made.

SPELLING REFORM 265

SPELLING REFORM AND THE CONSERVATION OF ENERGY

By Professor W. LE CONTE STEVENS

WASHINGTON AND LEK UNIVERSITY

n~^HE basis of modern physical science is the conservation of energy.
-■- This doctrine, that the sum of the energy in our universe is
constant while its modes of manifestation and transformation are
indefinitely variable, has been established only within the last century,
though vaguely foreshadowed many hundreds of years ago. Assuming
the use of any machine for the transmission of energy, the amount of
useful work done is less than the amount expended by the source be-
cause a part must be absorbed in the production and maintenance of
motion in the machine itself, and in friction. With the development
of heat and the radiation of this from the machine, energy that was
initially available becomes transformed and ceases to be available.
Such economic loss is physically a conservation.

The human brain is a machine for the transmission of energy, even
though the work thus done may not be so readily measurable as that
accomplished through the medium of a steam engine. The assimilation
of food is the process by which energy from external sources is applied
to the human machine and utilized through the medium of the brain.
No physiologist has yet been able to analyze the mechanism of thought,
but with the failure of the supply of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and nitro-
gen, which in suitable combination constitutes food, the power of
thought vanishes with the paralysis of the brain. The function of the
educator is to guide and help young human beings to use to the best
advantage every part of the human machine, and especially that part
whose function is to originate ideas, to convey them by the use of
suitable symbols, and to apply them for the benefit of the race.

The use of words for the oral conveyance of ideas, or of what are
intended to be such, has always been the favorite occupation of more
than a single sex. Every speaker acquires his own habits of expression
that become recognized among his associates. A certain amount of
what we familiarly call mental energy is put by him into the expression
of an idea. Another output of such energy is expended by the hearer
in the effort to take in that idea. Success is usually only partial, as
every practical teacher will sorrowfully admit. Clearness of thought
must precede clearness of expression, and this in turn must precede
clearness of apprehension. The man's style may not be ornate, it may
not be conventionally elegant, but it is good in proportion to his sue-

266 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

cess in conveying his ideas fully and accurately. In the process of
transfer he has reduced the friction and the waste of inertia to the ut-
most. The least amount of work has been lost in the operation of two
machines, the giving and the receiving, which form temporarily a
connected system ; and the active recipient's attention has been applied
with good economy.

Men do not require to be highly civilized before the need is felt for
the registration of ideas in addition to their oral transfer. Ideas are
first symbolized, and the translation of such symbols into words soon
suggests that words may be independently symbolized. The process
continues until words are analyzed into their components, and these
also are symbolized as letters. The art of spelling is thus born. But
whatever the stage of symbolization, the written idea can never be more
than an imperfect reproduction of the spoken idea, because symbols
are arbitrary. The interpretation of a group of symbols is a synthetic
process, and the opportunities for misunderstanding are fairly well
proportioned to the complexity of the word machine employed.

The art of spelling is thus a development from early crude attempts
to register spoken ideas and spoken words. The same word is often
pronounced so differently by different speakers as to be scarcely recog-
nizable. The English language when spoken by a highland Scotch
or Welsh tongue to the ear of an American mountaineer fulfills quite
well the dictum, commonly ascribed to Talleyrand, that the object of
language is to conceal thought. From the very nature of the case spell-
ing must vary as language varies. Orthodoxy may perhaps be as
unchangeable as its representatives are prone to claim, but spelling has
never been uniform, is not now uniform, and ought not to be more
uniform than is the spoken language among the best educated scholars
in great centers of population.

So long as literature was limited to manuscripts copied by pro-
fessional scribes and seen only by the few who could read, and whose
tastes prompted them to indulgence in such pleasure, spelling was as
unsettled as forms of speech. The invention of printing not only pro-
duced a vast increase in the diffusion of reading matter, but tended
to unify and give definiteness to the forms of symbolization. The
railroad, the steamship, the telegraph and the printing press have
been operated conjointly to bring all nations into closer communication
than was ever foreshadowed by the optimistic dreams of our fore-
fathers ; but the adoption of a single language for the civilized world is
still so far away in the future that no one gives the matter any serious
consideration. Such unification is conceivable, but if ever approached
it must be by gradual and almost imperceptible evolution, and not by
prescription from any source, however scholarly and apparently au-
thoritative. A new language, like Volaptik, even though theoretically
perfect, has not the ghost of a chance of adoption, because nobody is

SPELLING REFORM 267

willing to assume the labor of learning it or to use what would not be a
practical means of communication.

And so it is with spelling reform. Men have been free to spell in
any way that seemed best adapted to the reproduction of what they
wanted to convey. Variety in speech has been as natural as variety in
personal character, in dress or in amusement. Inconsistencies in fash-
ion will continue as long as men retain their personal liberty to select
idioms, words and spellings that suit the individual fancy of the user.
So long as a babel of different languages continues on earth will there
be a corresponding babel of spellings. There is no remedy but self-
interest. In making ourselves understood we are compelled to recog-
nize the conservation of energy. The man who writes a sentence must
consider not only his own thought-machine but also that of his reader.
Personal liberty to spell as a writer may find easiest or think best is
soon limited by the necessity to make himself easily intelligible. If his
spelling is very different from what has gradually become the fashion,
the blunderer is soon made aware that he is hard to understand, and
selfjinterest teaches him to avoid interposing obstacles between himself
and his constituency.

The printing-press has been the great unifier in the establishment
of fashion in spelling. But such fashion is not in the least sacred. In the
spelling of the English language the fashion has been set for the most
part in the printing office by foremen, or by mere type-setters who were
entirely innocent of any hostile designs against orthography, etymology
or logic. Professor Lounsbury has shown that the type-setting of the
earlier books in our language was done mostly by printers who had
come to England from the continent. In the city of Strasburg may
be seen to-day a statue erected to the memory of Gutenberg, whose first
crude invention of type was long unknown in England. Type-setting
was initially and most naturally a German art, and it would have been
very remarkable if the conservative and self-satisfied Englishman had
been found ready to adopt promptly any art that had its origin outside
of England. The intruding German or Dutchman could not be ex-
pected to possess much English scholarship, and in the printing room
nobody could direct him because no directions for spelling existed even
among the authors themselves. The Anglo-Saxon language had grown
naturally and healthily. The English language was not then known
to have any separate existence or special individuality. It later received
a large infusion of Norman-French, and the thought of consistency,
of uniformity in spelling or in anything else, had not occurred to
anybody. Chaucer was limited by no orthographic conventions, and if
his spelling could be improved by the Dutch printer his readers prob-
ably recognized the possibility that there might be room for improve-
ment. It was not his fault if the improvement was confided to in-
competent hands. His spelling was more consistent than that of to-day.

268 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Such being the early development of our ' system ' of English spell-
ing, it requires a peculiarly religious spirit to discover in it anything
sacred or worthy of special protection. The only protection that can
be reasonably asked is the protection of the individual from the trouble
of changing his habits, and this collectively means the protection of
society from the confusion and general inconvenience that would result
from sudden change of any kind if this could be effected by radical
reformers. No language exists in which the spelling is even approxi-
mately phonetic. Italian, Spanish and German are among the most
nearly exemplary tongues ; but any one who studies German in America
and then goes to Germany to spend a year or two, gradually discovers
a good many words of which he has to change his pronunciation. The
contrast, however, between German and English is conspicuous. It
would be a waste of time to dilate upon the inconsistencies, the foolish
freaks and stupid absurdities of English spelling and pronunciation.
The facts are quite generally admitted by all who possess even an
elementary knowledge of linguistics. The practical question is merely
that propounded thirty-five years ago by a famous criminal, ' What are
you going to do about it ? '

Let it be granted that printers of various grades of ignorance dur-
ing the last three or four centuries have accustomed the English-speak-
ing public to the most inconsistent spelling with which any civilized
people is loaded. All of us have spent months and years of early life
in the effort to learn this spelling, not because there is anything edu-
cative about it, but because of the unwritten law that inability to spell
' correctly ' is a sign of illiteracy. During the childhood of the present
writer this idea was emphasized to such an extent that in the spelling
class common words were of little interest. He was trained to feel a
certain pride in his ability to spell promptly and unerringly such test
words as gauge, hough, sough, fuchsia, bdellium, phthisical, eleemosy-
nary, metempsychosis, and tragododidascalicological. The spelling
match each week was a source of excitement, perhaps comparable in a
small way with such modern dissipation as bridge or football. All
of us have gone through this mill with varying grades of success so
that our eyes have become accustomed to the absurdities, and our as-
sociations are violated when we look upon improved forms. It is easier
to recognize 'though' than 'tho'; 'through' than 'thru'; 'kissed'
than 'kist'; 'rhyme' than 'rime'; 'thoroughly' than 'thoroly.'
Most persons think the improved forms unsightly. This means nothing
except that they are unfamiliar.

To reform our language to such an extent as to make it logical
and consistent is scarcely conceivable. Attempts to do so have been
made on paper, but practically they have resulted in nothing better
than rainbow chasing. Our alphabet is radically bad, having a super-
fluity of symbols for certain simple sounds, and no single symbols for

SPELLING REFORM 269

other elements of speech. Most of our vowels are sounded a variety
of different ways, the most common ways being inconsistent with the
sounds agreed upon in other modern languages. Spelling reformers
have been agitating this matter for fifty years, but we are apparently
no more ready to reform our alphabet now than when they began.
Some of them, accepting the existence of an unchangeable alphabet,
have persistently advocated the adoption of a strictly phonetic system
of spelling; but, if they have made any practical progress outside of
the volumes of proceedings of educational and philological conven-
tions, it has been limited to the few enthusiasts who were willing to
acquire the reputation of being peculiar and ill balanced.

The movements in behalf of alphabetic reform and phonetic spelling
have been made in complete disregard of the conservation of energy.
The habits of the people must be recognized. A page of English printed
in an amended alphabet is, to even intelligent persons, simply unread-
able. It has to be slowly and painfully deciphered, like a page of Greek.
It may, like Greek, be read if one will be patient enough, but the diffi-
culties are crowded initially, and the man who is not a professional
philologist exercises his right of choice and rejects what he finds bris-
tling with difficulties. Let the page of English be printed now in
ordinary type, but phonetically. The word ' physics,' for example, is
spelled 'fizix.' This also, like Greek, may be deciphered, but the page
will require a great waste of energy with no reward beyond the mastery
of unnecessary difficulties. Let any business man conduct his corre-
spondence for a single week in such style. His customers are immedi-
ately convinced that the object of language thus expressed is to con-
ceal thought, and the pecuniary results may be readily inferred. Let
a publisher put forth a new book in phonetic spelling. On neither side
of the Atlantic would one reader in a hundred be found ready to buy
it, or patient enough to read it if curiosity has prompted the purchase.

The recognition of these great obstacles to reform does not imply
that whatever is, is right, or that reform is impossible. Let us assume
that a cannon ball weighing half a ton is to be moved by a little child,
using nothing stronger than cotton thread. It may be suspended by a
steel chain from a support of known height, for example thirteen or
fourteen feet, thus forming a big pendulum whose period is readily
calculated to be about four seconds. Let the thread be attached to a
hook on the side of the ball. A jerk from even a baby's hand is suffi-
cient to snap it. But if a succession of gentle pulls be given at inter-
vals of just four seconds, each too faint to break the thread, a few hours
of such light work, patiently maintained, will be sufficient to make the
pendulum swing through a perceptible arc. The advocates of alpha-
betic and phonetic reform have been jerking the thread, and they will
continually fail to move the ball so long as they refuse to recognize
its formidable inertia. People who are accustomed to bad habits,

27o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

whether relating to spelling or to anything else, need to be pulled
gently, periodically and patiently. They are proof against argument,
dictation, ridicule, legislation or physical force; but they will slowly
yield if pulled in the right way and in the right succession.

However important may have been the influence of half-educated
printers in the fastening of a hereditary spelling disease upon the users
of the English language, the responsibility does not rest wholly upon
them. Like other people, printers endeavor to adapt themselves to
popular demands. The great classical schools of England have done
much to infuse Latin and Greek into the language and to cultivate
classical forms of spelling. Against the orthographic riot due to the
early printers a reaction was inevitable. They gradually discarded
many of the worst word forms that had been brought into use, but in
the selection of surviving forms they had but small guidance from
competent scholars. An approach toward uniformity was made, but
it was under the domination of conservatism rather than reason or
consistency, and popular habits were formed with no regard for sim-
plicity or etymology. In the earlier English dictionaries by Bailey
and Johnson very little was done to correct the prevailing inconsist-
encies. Johnson's great force of character made him a power among
men. His knowledge of Latin was exceptional, but of etymology he
knew little and cared less. As a lexicographer he was narrow, preju-
diced and illogical. His dictionary was made the basis of Walker's
dictionary, which in time attained wide currency on both sides of the
Atlantic.

In all of these dictionaries it was apparently assumed that the
function of the lexicographer is to record and define the words in
current use, but not to search out or expose inconsistencies. The
incongruities of our language make the dictionary more important as
a reference book than it deserves to be. To this day multitudes of
people accept without question what they find as allowed spelling in
Webster or Worcester; and they resent any criticism upon what they
consider to be established by the favorite standard.

What then are we to do about it ?

The first and most important thing is to recognize the facts of
human nature and the conservation of energy. This has been done by
a small band of scholarly men, who have become incorporated during
the year just ended as the Simplified Spelling Board, and to whom has
been given the practical support of Andrew Carnegie and Theodore
Eoosevelt. This board recognizes the futility of trying to coerce the
public, of trying to change the alphabet, of trying to secure immediate
phonetic spelling, of advocating any radical changes, however desirable
these may be theoretically. It has no intention of trying to set the
pendulum into motion by breaking the thread. Its chief object is to
attract the attention of the public to the history and present condition

SPELLING REFORM 271

of English spelling; to convince the public that fashion in spelling is
not sacred ; that our language is and ought to be a developing language ;
that development should be guided as far as possible toward simplicity
and directness. It advocates the gradual approach to simplicity by
neglecting useless letters in words commonly employed. It does not
claim for itself authority to standardize our language, but seeks to get
rid of the excrescences which make our language unreasonably difficult.
It wishes to secure the establishment and extension of good usage, to
make it national and international. It does not expect to escape the
criticism of those who have learned to love the faults of our tongue,
but only asks to be treated with fairness and not to be condemned for
what it has never advocated.

As a first step the board has issued a now famous list of three
hundred words which are commonly spelled in two or more ways, and
it recommends the simplest of these spellings in every case. Many of
the simple forms have already gained such currency in America as to
be called Americanisms by our British cousins. Fifty years ago very
few of them were current here, but their adoption has been steady,
especially among business men, and their increasing popularity is
based upon the American fondness for directness. On examining this
list the present writer has found himself already habituated to the
use of more than half of the simplified forms, though the more
complex forms were all taught him in childhood. He is not conscious
of having ever attained a local reputation for oddity in spelling. The
changes in practise have been made gradually and to a large extent
unconsciously. The remaining half of the list may perhaps become
assimilated in due time, but no sudden change can be made now. It
would be too inconvenient and difficult. As an advocate of simplified
spelling he is unwilling to subject himself to an implied obligation to
reverse old habits at once; but his mental attitude is that of approval
and sympathy with a reform that is based on strong common sense.
Inertia must be allowed for, and the pull on the pendulum must be
properly timed.

President Eoosevelt, Mr. Carnegie and the Simplified Spelling
Board have been the objects of widely varying criticism. The greatest
good they have done has been to focus public attention upon abuses
which are of small concern to great people, but of great concern to small
people. The little folks at school have no prejudices about ortho-
graphic propriety, and no burdens should be piled upon them merely
for the sake of maintaining old blunders. An English critic of Ameri-
can ways considers it blasphemy .to spell ' Savior ' without a u. Let
the English do as they find best ; ours is the American language. Our
declaration of independence will involve no bloodshed.

The opposition of Congress, and the consequent necessity for the
withdrawal of President Eoosevelt's executive order in behalf of simpli-

2 72 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tied spelling, given to the public printer at Washington, was not a
surprising development. The sudden adoption of two or three hun-
dred changes at one time was too strong a jerk on the big' congressional
pendulum. But all these simplified forms will quite surely be incor-
porated in the great American dictionaries at an early day in their
lists of alternative spellings. The public printer will thus be free
to secure their gradual use in documents issued by the government.
.Readers of periodicals in which the simplified forms have already been
in use, such as The Literary Digest, find no difficulty in taking in ideas,
even if such forms as ' tho/ ' thru ' and ' prest ' are occasionally encoun-
tered. These periodicals are quietly doing effective work by dispelling
the novelty of the improvements. In deference to public prejudice
such forms as ' thru ' are perhaps best neglected for the present, while
' tho ' is used, since consistency is of little importance in comparison
with tact. The Simplified Spelling Board can only recommend; the
public will do the adopting in response to gentle and well-timed per-
suasion, and reasonable respect will be manifested toward the con-
servation of energy.

In conclusion the following propositions are presented by way of
summary :

1. Inability to spell conventionally is not necessarily or deservedly
an index of illiteracy.

2. Conventional spelling is a mere fashion, worthy of no respect
when it implies the sacrifice of economy. In judging economy we
must consider ease in the transfer of ideas. That spelling is best which
is most readily intelligible.

3. Nobody can be reasonably expected to adopt more than a few
changes at a time. A writer occupies himself with ideas rather than
verbal forms. The simplified forms must be applied chiefly in the
printing office, where forms are all-important. Change of habit must
result chiefly from the unconscious training received by the eye in
reading such simplified forms already in print.

4. Children should be taught simplified spelling. They will addi-
tionally learn the old conventional forms outside of the school-room,
and should be free to exercise their own preferences so long as they
are consistent in the employment of either system.

5. The simplification of our spelling does not imply the adoption
of a new alphabet, or indulgence in objectionable phonetic eccentricities.
All improvements are initially unfamiliar, and those who advocate them
may be temporarily considered unfashionable, but reason in fashion
has a better chance to prevail in America than in England, or in any
other country where our common but necessarily variant language is
spoken and written.

6. For the improvement of spelling there is always the need of
moderate and practical reformers. The same slow process of change

SPELLING REFORM 273

that has been distinctly perceptible during the last half century may
be expected to continue, but at a diminishing rate if nothing is done
to accelerate it. All fashions tend toward fixity; and unless change is
urged by those who are willing to appear at times a little odd, the old
absurdities will for the most part continue indefinitely. The language
is not going to change itself as a result of being proved inconsistent.
No fashion is ever changed except by the exercise of personal initiative,
but to secure change regard must be had for the difficulties experienced
by the reader. The writer who adopts the simplified spelling has to be
continually thinking of his spelling until new habits are formed, and
his reader has to experience a succession of shocks that are at first
irritating. The amount of friction in the complex thought machine
is decidedly increased until it becomes worn smooth by such friction.
Each advocate of improvement must use his own judgment as to the
extent of his violation of conventional forms, but such violation must
be perpetrated by him just so far as may be consistent with sane
recognition of the conservation of energy.

vol. lxx. — 18.

274 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

FKITZ SCHAUDi™1

By Professor THOS. H. MONTGOMERY, Jr., Ph.D.

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

TpEOM the medical and biological world a genius has been taken.
-*- and it is not saying too much to conclude that the only man
of the past half century who may be considered in any way the equal
of Louis Pasteur is Fritz Schaudinn. Yet when Schaudinn died, on
the twenty-second of last June, he was in only his thirty-fifth year.
Truly those whom the gods love die young! The work of his life is
so recent that only the perspective of time can throw it out in its true
proportions; but rarely has it fallen to the lot of any man to receive
the quick recognition of value that has been so generally conceded to
Schaudinn.

With the exception of a few contributions on the worm Ankylos-
tomum, on bear animalcules (Tardigrades) , and on bacteria, the atten-
tion of Schaudinn was devoted entirely to the Protozoa; Dujardin,
Max Schultze and Schaudinn, each of these marked a great advance
in our knowledge of the unicellular animals, and of them Schaudinn
covered the most difficult field. For his study of the Protozoa was an
intensive examination of their complex life cycles, undertaken first to
elucidate their genetic relationships and the meaning of alternation of
generations, and second to break a road to the checking of human dis-
eases. His discoveries are of fundamental importance for the under-
standing of the genesis of the cell, particularly of the phenomena of
conjugation and the reduction of the chromosomes, for our ideas of
the genetic relations of the various Protozoan groups, and for the
prevention of disease. It may be said that before Schaudinn entered
the field almost all human infectious diseases were supposed to be due
to bacteria, with the exception of the malaria parasite and certain few
agents doubtfully associated with unimportant disorders. To Schau-
dinn more than to any other belongs the credit of the demonstration
that the Protozoa are fully as efficient as the bacteria in transmitting
and engendering disease. Indeed, the greatest advance in medicine of
the past twenty years may be said to be just this conclusion. Schau-
dinn's particular merit lies in his insistence that the first step in com-
bating any disease must be to understand the whole life cycle of the
disease germ; and his genius, in his admirable and unequaled success

1 Contributions from the Zoological Laboratory of the University of Texas,
No. 83.

FRITZ SCHAUDINN 275

in solving each complex life cycle that he undertook to investigate.
All his discoveries were comprehensive and thorough, they settled the
particular questions examined, and this though he selected problems
the most difficult of solution. By all his training he was a zoologist,
and he is a splendid instance of the fact that comprehensive results in
medicine are possible only to him who has a broad biological founda-
tion on which to build. The study of human disease is to be success-
ful not so much by close study of human parasites only, but rather
by investigation, through broad comparisons, of the animal and plant
groups to which the parasites belong; in that method only is surety
given.

For two years it was my privilege to work in the same room with
Schaudinn as a fellow student, in the Zoologisches Institut at Berlin;
accordingly, this little account of his life is as much the message of
a friend as of an admirer. Of the group of students at that labora-
tory from 1891 on, Schaudinn was the leader from his great and
rare natural modesty, as well as from his forceful character and power
of tremendous application. With regard to the latter quality I well
recall how on one occasion, while with exquisite ardor he was follow-
ing the stages of a life cycle, he spent more than thirty uninterrupted
hours at his microscope. With all his humor, his hearty laugh and
his popularity, he rarely spent an evening at the Weinstube or the Bier-
halle, but for his recreation took long walks into the countryside,
showing a delight in every phase of nature. Perhaps the chief secret
of his success was his almost intuitive ability to select the important
phenomenon from the less important, and to focus his mind on that;
he never allowed himself to become bewildered by the multitude of the
facts, truly a rare gift.

Immediately after his death there appeared an appreciative account
of his life by his old teacher, Professor Karl Heider, of Innsbruck;
then a second by Professor Gary N. Calkins, of Columbia University,
this printed in Science; and within the past two months more detailed
biographical accounts by Professor Kichard Hertwig, of Munich, and
F. W. Winter, of Frankfurt-am-Main. The last named is the most
complete yet given, and was published in the Zoologischer Anzeiger,
November 13; it gives a careful analysis of his various papers and
labors, together with a complete bibliography.

Fritz Eichard Schaudinn was born in Boseningken in East Prussia
in 1871. In the laboratory of F. E. Schulze in Berlin he commenced
his investigations on Protozoa in 1892. His first years there were
devoted to the investigation of free-living species, both freshwater and
marine, and the rhizopods in particular. Before he made his doctor-
ate he settled a long controversy by demonstrating that the two forms
of many-chambered foraminifera, those with a large and those with a

276 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

small embryonal chamber, represent different stages in the same life
history. He elucidated the life cycle of Calcituba, and discovered in
it a simple and probably very primitive mode of cell division. The
division of the Amoeba with two nuclei (Amoeba binucleata) was de-
scribed, and from Schaudinn dates the concept that the original cell
possessed two nuclei. Then he described the copulation of the Helio-
zoan Actinoplirys, which was the first account of reduction of the chro-
matin and caryogamy of any protozoan, compared the processes here
with the similar ones in the many-celled animals, and showed that the
central granule acted as a centrosome. Conjugation of the spores was
also discovered in Hyalopus, a f oraminif eran ; and his discovery of the
paranucleus of Paramceba has come to greatly modify the older ideas
on the genesis of the cell nucleus. These discoveries rapidly suc-
ceeded each other, marked a great advance over all preceding studies
on the reproduction phenomena of the protozoa, and stimulated others
to the same field of study.

Next he turned himself to the analysis of the life cycles of para-
sitic protozoa, a study of particular difficulty because all such parasites
live in successive different hosts. Most men have failed in these stud-
ies because they lacked the fertility and resource of Schaudinn in de-
vising experiments. Monumental was his study on the complete life
cycle of a coccidian (a sporozoan), a parasite of a centipede (Litho-
bius), made in conjunction with Siedlecki. This gave for the first
time the complete history of any sporozoan, and was soon followed
by an equally conclusive and thorough research, extending through
five years, of the life cycle of Trichosphcerium. These are classics in
the study of the protozoa, and they showed the method by which results
are to be reached in the search of the parasites of human disorders.
In each of these life cycles there follow upon each other a long line
of generations, with great dissimilarity of the successive generations;
Schaudinn drove home the conclusion that the unit of study should
be the whole life cycle, and his results rendered it probable that many
forms of protozoa that had hitherto been regarded as different species
might be merely stages of one and the same life cycle. This was one
of his major contributions that guided him in his later work and has
caused an entire change in progressive medicine.

Schaudinn then left Berlin to become director of the laboratory
at Eovigno, on the Adriatic Sea, whither he was called primarily
to contribute to the study of the malaria organisms. There he first
worked out the life history of Cyclospora, the agent of enteritis of the
mole, carrying out his method to approach human disorders from a
preliminary broad comparative basis. Then he made a valuable contri-
bution to the history of Plasmodium vivax, the cause of tertian fever
in man; and was the first to see the sporozoites entering living human

FRITZ 8CHAUDINN 277

blood corpuscles. The sanitary recommendations then recommended
by him against malaria were adopted by the Austrian government.
Further, he made observations on the biology of the mosquito that
carries these protozoa. Then he worked out a blood parasite of the
lizard, and discovered a Rhizopod, Leydenia, in the ascites fluid of man.

His next step was to study the parasites of the human colon,
which had been called Amaiba coli. Schaudinn discovered that this
really is two distinct species, one of which is harmless, while the other,
Entamoeba histolytica, he proved to be the cause of human bloody
dysentery.

His following contributions were devoted to the study of blood
parasites, so-called hgemosphoridia. His initial memoir upon this
subject was one of his most important. He studied the three blood-
parasites of the owl, known as Proteosoma, Halteridium and Hcema-
mozba, which he proved to be stages of one and the same life cycle
and to be flagellates and not sporozoa. Here also may be mentioned
his conclusion that the organisms of human malaria are also flagel-
lates. In connection with this study he worked out the biology of
the mosquito (Culex pipiens) that infects the owl, and its mode of
transference of the parasites. In his investigation of Spirochete
ziemanni he made the important discovery that the two main forms
of blood flagellates, Spirochcete and Trypanosoma, are not bacteria, but
flagellates, a discovery that has wonderfully clarified our knowledge
of blood diseases.

In 1904 Schaudinn left Rovigno to enter the National Sanitary
Commission at Berlin. He was fully recognized as the foremost in-
vestigator of Protozoan diseases, and though he had never studied
medicine he became its consultant authority in Germany. Unwisely
the German government for a time placed hindrances to his free
initiative, and forced him to undertake certain work outside of his
proper field; he had no choice but to accept these conditions, for he
was a poor man with a family to support. Principles of patriotism
decided him to decline a call to the professorship of protozoology
recently started by the British government for the investigation of
tropical diseases. At this time Schaudinn corroborated the interest-
ing discovery of Looss, that the round worm Ankylostomum infects
the mammalian host not through the mouth, but by entering the
skin then being transported by the blood current to the lung, and
thence to the intestine.

Perhaps what is the most important medical discovery made by
him was that of 1905, when he found in the secretions of syphilitic
growths a parasitic flagellate that he named Spirochcete pallida. Long
had physicians searched for the cause of this disease, one of the most
widespread and terrible of human disorders, and it was the crown-
ing act of Schaudinn's life to have found it.

278 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Early in 1906 Schaudinn was appointed zoologist to the Institute
for Ship and Tropical Diseases at Hamburg, a position that he gladly
accepted, because it gave him perfect freedom for his studies and for
the first time in his career an income that freed him from financial
cares. But within a few months he fell a victim to intestinal abscesses,
from which he had suffered for years and which he may have con-
tracted through infection during his studies on the protozoa of the
human intestine.

Most of Schaudinn's memoirs were briefly and concisely written,
for he disliked to take time from his observations to put it on writ-
ing. As Richard Hertwig says of him, 'he was not a man of the
writing table.' With his death, accordingly, as in the case of other
great men, many of his important results have been lost to science.
His descriptions are remarkable for their lucidity, as his experiments
for their simplicity.

He was essentially a phylogenist, an investigator of racial history
by the analysis of individual life cycles, and his achievements furnish the
best possible evidence of the fruitfulness of phylogenetic study. He
never called in to his aid hypothetical units, but each and every step
in his conclusions was based directly upon empirical evidence; he was
not a theorist, but a demonstrator. Cytology has to thank him for
tracing the genesis of the centrosome, of chromosome reduction and
conjugation; biology in general for demonstrating the necessity of con-
sidering the life cycle as a unit, and for having so greatly extended
our knowledge of life cycles; medicine recognizes his lasting influence
in the study of malaria, as the discoverer of the disease germs of
dysentery and syphilis, and for pointing out the methods to follow in
the study of protozoan disorders.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 279

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

By M. H. POINCARE

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

Chapter VI. Astronomy.

/"^ OVEENMENTS and parliaments must find that astronomy is
^-* one of the sciences which cost most dear: the least instrument
costs hundreds of thousands of dollars, the least observatory costs
millions; each eclipse carries with it supplementary appropriations.
And all that for stars which are so far away, which are complete
strangers to our electoral contests, and in all probability will never
take any part in them. It must be that our politicians have retained
a remnant of idealism, a vague instinct for what is grand; truly, I
think they have been calumniated; they should be encouraged and
shown that this instinct does not deceive them, that they are not
dupes of that idealism.

We might indeed speak to them of navigation, of which no one
can underestimate the importance, and which has need of astronomy.
But this would be to take the question by its smaller side.

Astronomy is useful because it raises us above ourselves; it is
useful because it is grand; that is what we should say. It shows
us how small is man's body, how great his mind, since his intelli-
gence can embrace the whole of this dazzling immensity, where his
body is only an obscure point, and enjoy its silent harmony. Thus
we attain the consciousness of our power, and this is something which
can not cost too dear, since this consciousness makes us mightier.

But what I should wish before all to show is, to what point as-
tronomy has facilitated the work of the other sciences, more directly
useful, since it has given us a soul capable of comprehending nature.

Think how diminished humanity would be if, under heavens con-
stantly overclouded, as Jupiter's must be, it had forever remained
ignorant of the stars. Do you think that in such a world we should
be what we are? I know well that under this somber vault we should
have been deprived of the light of the sun, necessary to organisms
like those which inhabit the earth. But if you please, we shall as-
sume that these clouds are phosphorescent and emit a soft and con-
stant light. Since we are making hypotheses, another will cost no
more. Well ! I repeat my question : Do you think that in such a
world we should be what we are ?

28o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

The stars send us not only that visible and gross light which
strikes our bodily eyes, but from them also comes to us a light far
more subtle, which illuminates our minds and whose effects I shall
try to show you. You know what man was on the earth some thou-
sands of years ago, and what he is to-day. Isolated amidst a nature
where everything was a mystery to him, terrified at each unexpected
manifestation of incomprehensible forces, he was incapable of see-
ing in the conduct of the universe anything but caprice; he at-
tributed all phenomena to the action of a multitude of little genii,
fantastic and exacting, and to act on the world he sought to con-
ciliate them by means analogous to those employed to gain the good
graces of a minister or a deputy. Even his failures did not enlighten
him, any more than to-day a beggar refused is discouraged to the point
of ceasing to beg.

To-day we no longer beg of nature; we command her, because we
have discovered certain of her secrets and shall discover others each
day. We command her in the name of laws she can not challenge
because they are hers; these laws we do not madly ask her to change,
we are the first to submit to them. Nature can only be governed
by obeying her.

What a change must our souls have undergone to pass from the
one state to the other! Does any one believe that, without the lessons
of the stars, under the heavens perpetually overclouded that I have just
supposed, they would have changed so quickly? Would the meta-
morphosis have been possible, or at least would it not have been
much slower?

And first of all, astronomy it is which taught that there are laws.
The Chaldeans, who were the first to observe the heavens with some
attention, saw that this multitude of luminous points is not a con-
fused crowd wandering at random, but rather a disciplined army.
Doubtless the rules of this discipline escaped them, but the har-
monious spectacle of the starry night sufficed to give them the im-
pression of regularity, and that was in itself already a great thing.
Besides, these rules were discerned by Hipparchus, Ptolemy, Coper-
nicus, Kepler, one after another, and finally, it is needless to recall
that Newton it was who enunciated the oldest, the most precise, the
most simple, the most general of all natural laws.

And then, taught by this example, we have seen our little ter-
restrial world better and, under the apparent disorder, there also
we have found again the harmony that the study of the heavens
had revealed to us. It also is regular, it also obeys immutable laws,
but they are more complicated, in apparent conflict one with an-
other, and an eye untrained by other sights would have seen there
only chaos and the reign of chance or caprice. If we had not known

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 281

the stars, some bold spirits might perhaps have sought to foresee
physical phenomena; but their failures would have been frequent,
and they would have excited only the derision of the vulgar; do we
not see, that even in our day the meteorologists sometimes deceive
themselves, and that certain persons are inclined to laugh at them.

How often would the physicist, disheartened by so many checks,
have fallen into discouragement, if they had not had, to sustain their
confidence, the brilliant example of the success of the astronomers !
This success showed them that nature obeys laws; it only remained
to know what laws; for that they only needed patience, and they
had the right to demand that the sceptics should give them credit.

This is not all: astronomy has not only taught us that there are
laws, but that from these laws there is no escape, that with them there
is no possible compromise. How much time should we have needed
to comprehend that fact, if we had known only the terrestrial world,
where each elemental force would always seem to us in conflict with
other forces? Astronomy has taught us that the laws are infinitely
precise, and that if those we enunciate are approximative, it is be-
cause we do not know them well. Aristotle, the most scientific mind
of antiquity, still accorded a part to accident, to chance, and seemed
to think that the laws of nature, at least here below, determine only
the large features of phenomena. How much has the ever-increasing
precision of astronomical predictions contributed to correct such an
error, which would have rendered nature unintelligible!

But are these laws not local, varying in different places, like those
which men make; does not that which is truth in one corner of the
universe, on our globe for instance, or in our little solar system, be-
come error a little farther away? And then could it not be asked
whether laws depending on space do not also depend upon time,
whether they are not simple habitudes, transitory, therefore, and
ephemeral? Again it is astronomy that answers this question. Con-
sider the double stars; all describe conies; thus, as far as the tele-
scope carries, it does not reach the limits of the domain which obeys
Newton's law.

Even the simplicity of this law is a lesson for us; how many com-
plicated phenomena are contained in the two lines of its enunciation;
persons who do not understand celestial mechanics may form some
idea of it at least from the size of the treatises devoted to this science;
and then it may be hoped that the complication of physical phenomena
likewise hides from us some simple cause still unknown.

It is therefore astronomy which has shown us what are the general
characteristics of natural laws; but among these characteristics there
is one, the most subtile and the most important of all, which I shall
ask leave to stress.

282 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

How was the order of the universe understood by the ancients;
for instance, by Pythagoras, Plato or Aristotle? It was either an
immutable type fixed once for all, or an ideal to which the world
sought to approach. Kepler himself still thought thus when, for
instance, he sought whether the distances of the planets from the sun
had not some relation to the five regular polyhedrons. This idea
contained nothing absurd, but it was sterile, since nature is not so
made. Newton has shown us that a law is only a necessary relation
between the present state of the world and its immediately subsequent
state. All the other laws since discovered are nothing else; they are
in sum, differential equations; but it is astronomy which furnished
the first model for them, without which we should doubtless long
have erred.

Astronomy has also taught us to set at naught appearances. The
day Copernicus proved that what was thought the most stable was
in motion, that what was thought moving was fixed, he showed us
how deceptive could be the infantile reasonings which spring directly
from the immediate data of our senses. True, his ideas did not
easily triumph, but since this triumph there is no longer a prejudice
so inveterate that we can not shake it off. How can we estimate the
value of the new weapon thus won?

The ancients thought everything was made for man, and this il-
lusion must be very tenacious, since it must ever be combated. Yet
it is necessary to divest oneself of it ; or else one will be only an eternal
myope, incapable of seeing the truth. To comprehend nature one
must be able to get out of self, so to speak, and to contemplate her
from many different points of view; otherwise we never shall know
more than one side. Now, to get out of self is what he who refers
everything to himself can not do. Who delivered us from this illusion ?
It was those who showed us that the earth is only one of the smallest
planets of the solar system, and that the solar system itself is only
an imperceptible point in the infinite spaces of the stellar universe.

At the same time astronomy taught us not to be afraid of big
numbers. This was needful, not only for knowing the heavens, but to
know the earth itself; and was not sO easy as it seems to us to-day.
Let us try to go back and picture to ourselves what a Greek would
have thought if told that red light vibrates four hundred millions
of millions of times per second. Without any doubt, such an assertion
would have appeared to him pure madness, and he never would have
lowered himself to test it. To-day an hypothesis will no longer
appear absurd to us because it obliges us to imagine objects much
larger or smaller than those our senses are capable of showing us,
and we no longer comprehend those scruples which arrested our pre-
decessors and prevented them from discovering certain truths simply

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 283

because they were afraid of them. But why? It is because we have
seen the heavens enlarging and enlarging without cease; because we
know that the sun is 150 millions of kilometers from the earth and
that the distances of the nearest stars are hundreds of thousands of
times greater yet. Habituated to the contemplation of the infinitely
great, we have become apt to comprehend the infinitely small. Thanks
to the education it has received, our imagination, like the eagle's eye
that the sun does not dazzle, can look truth in the face.

Was I wrong in saying that it is astronomy which has made us a
soul capable of comprehending nature; that under heavens always
overcast and starless, the earth itself would have been for us eternally
unintelligible; that we should there have seen only caprice and dis-
order; and that, not knowing the world, we should never have been
able to subdue it? What science could have been more useful? And
in thus speaking I put myself at the point of view of those who only
value practical applications. Certainly, this point of view is not mine ;
as for me, on the contrary, if I admire the conquests of industry, it
is above all because if they free us from material cares, they will one
day give to all the leisure to contemplate nature. I do not say:
Science is useful, because it teaches us to construct machines. I say:
Machines are useful, because in working for us, they will some day
leave us more time to make science. But finally it is worth remarking
that between the two points of view there is no antagonism, and that
man having pursued a disinterested aim, all else has been added unto
him.

Auguste Comte has said somewhere, that it would be idle to seek
to know the composition of the sun, since this knowledge would be
of no use to sociology. How could he be so short-sighted? Have we
not just seen that it is by astronomy that, to speak his language,
humanity has passed from the theological to the positive state? He
found an explanation for that because it had happened. But how has
he not understood that what remained to do was not less considerable
and would be not less profitable ? Physical astronomy, which he seems
to condemn, has already begun to bear fruit, and it will give us much
more, for it only dates from yesterday.

First was discovered the nature of the sun, what the founder of
positivism wished to deny us, and there bodies were found which exist
on the earth, but had here remained undiscovered ; for example, helium,
that gas almost as light as hydrogen. That already contradicted
Comte. But to the spectroscope we owe a lesson precious in a quite
different way; in the most distant stars, it shows us the same sub-
stances. It might have been asked whether the terrestrial elements
were not due to some chance which had brought together more tenuous
atoms to construct of them the more complex edifice that the chemists

284 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

call atoms; whether, in other regions of the universe, other fortuitous
meetings had not engendered edifices entirely different. Now we know
that this is not so, that the laws of our chemistry are the general laws
of nature, and that they owe nothing to the chance which caused
us to be born on the earth.

But, it will be said, astronomy has given to the other sciences
all it can give them, and now that the heavens have procured for
us the instruments which enable us to study terrestrial nature, they
could without danger veil themselves forever. After what we have
just said, is there still need to answer this objection? One could have
reasoned the same in Ptolemy's time; then also men thought they
knew everything, and they still had almost everything to learn.

The stars are majestic laboratories, gigantic crucibles, such as no
chemist could dream. There reign temperatures impossible for us
to realize. Their only defect is being a little far away; but the tele-
scope will soon bring them near to us, and then we shall see how
matter acts there. What good fortune for the physicist and the
chemist !

Matter will there exhibit itself to us under a thousand different
states, from those rarefied gases which seem to form the nebula and
which are luminous with I know not what glimmering of mysterious
origin, even to the incandescent stars and to the planets so near and
yet so different.

Perchance even, the stars will some day teach us something about
life; that seems an insensate dream and I do not at all see how it can
be realized; but, a hundred years ago, would not the chemistry of the
stars have also appeared a mad dream?

But limiting our views to horizons less distant, there still will re-
main to us promises less contingent and yet sufficiently seductive. If
the past has given us much, we may rest assured that the future
will give us still more.

After all, it could scarce be believed how useful belief in astrology
has been to humanity. If Kepler and Tycho Brahe made a living,
it was because they sold to naive kings predictions founded on the
conjunctions of the stars. If these princes had not been so credulous,
we should perhaps continue to believe that nature obeys caprice, and
we should still wallow in ignorance.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

285

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
AND ITS SECRETARY

The regents of the Smithsonian In-
stitution at their annual meeting on
January 23 elected Dr. Charles D. Wal-
cott to succeed the late Samuel Pier-
pont Langley as secretary of the insti-
tution. Born in New York State in
1850, Dr. Walcott became assistant in
the Geological Survey of the state in
1876, passing to the U. S. Geological
Survey in 1879. In 1894 he succeeded
Major Powell as director of the na-
tional survey, which under his admin-
istration has enjoyed an unprecedented
development, the annual appropriation
by congress for its work being in the
neighborhood of $1,500,000. The survey
has been criticized for bureaucratic
methods, for trespassing on fields occu-
pied by other geologists and for turn-
ing out a vast amount of routine work
rather than discoveries of the highest
order. To this it is replied that the
efficiency of a government bureau, espe-
cially one that is rapidly developing,
requires adequate business manage-
ment, that the spirit of cooperation
and research in the survey is excellent,
that when a new institution develops
on a large scale a certain amount of
temporary conflict of interests is in-
evitable, that the standing of geologists
in the survey is as high as of those in
the universities, that indeed in no
single science in any institution in the
world are there so many men engaged
in scientific research.

When the Reclamation Service was
established by the congress, its exten-
sive work in irrigation was placed un-
der the Geological Survey, and it has
been carried forward with an efficiency
and economy comparing most favorably
with the conditions on the Isthmian

Canal. When the service was well or-
ganized it was separated from the sur-
vey. On the organization of the Car-
negie Institution, Dr. Walcott became
secretary, and was responsible for a
large share of the administrative work.
He, however, withdrew from this posi-
tion after Dr. Woodward's election to
the presidency. He was also for a
short time acting-assistant secretary of
the Smithsonian Institution in charge
of the National Museum, and has been
since 1892 honorary curator of paleon-
tology in the museum.

Dr. Walcott was vice-president of the
American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science in 1903, has been presi-
dent of the Washington Academy of
Sciences since 1899 and became a mem-
ber of the National Academy of Sci-
ences in 1896. He has received the doc-
torate of laws from Hamilton, Chicago,
Johns Hopkins and Pennsylvania. He
has become eminent for his researches
on the stratigraphy and paleontology
of the lower Paleozoic formation and
the sedimentation, stratigraphy and
contained faunas of the Cambrian
formation.

The acceptance of the secretaryship
of the Smithsonian Institution involves
unusual responsibilities. It is gener-
ally regarded as the highest scientific
office in the country; indeed it is pos-
sible that a too obvious halo has been
painted about the head of the secre-
tary. The organization of the insti-
tution is such as to give to him
great, perhaps undue, powers. The
regents are the vice-president and the
chief justice of the United States, six
congressmen and six citizens. They
have, as a rule, met for an hour or two
once a year to listen to the report of
the secretary; they have neither time
nor competence to direct the policy of

286

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the institution. The conditions are
somewhat similar in many of our uni-
versities, but there the faculties have
a certain moral control, however lim-
ited their statutory rights. So far as
appears in the annual reports, there is
not a single scientific man, except the
secretary, on the Smithsonian founda-
tion, and the scientific men employed
in the dependencies are likely to receive
the salaries and treatment of depart-
mental clerks. Thus the late secretary
could write in his annual report in re-
gard to the Bureau of American Eth-
nology : ' The actual conduct of these
investigations has been continued by
the secretary in the hands of Major
Powell,' and he could appoint a suc-
cessor to Major Powell and alter the
title from director to chief without the
advice of the regents or of any body
of scientific experts.

It is well known that a large part of
the scientific work under the govern-
ment had its origin in the Smithsonian
Institution, but Henry, the first secre-
tary, was always ready to relinquish
work that could be done elsewhere,
leaving to the Smithsonian what it
only could do. The opposite policy has
been followed in recent years, and the
National Museum and other agencies
supported by the government have not
only been kept under the Smithsonian,
but have been subordinated to the per-
sonal control of the secretary. The
propriety of using Smithson's unique
bequest for the support of govern-
mental institutions is doubtful, and the
result has not been favorable. The
National Museum, for example, whether
regarded as an educational or research
institution, is insignificant when com-
pared with the Museums of Natural
History and Fine Arts in New York
City, or the similar institutions of
foreign nations.

It may be unwise to detach the vari-
ous governmental agencies from the
control of the Smithsonian regents at
present, or so long as we have no de-
partment of science and education. Di-
rectors should, however, be found for

the National Museum and other agen-
cies, and scientific men of high stand-
ing should be attracted to these institu-
tions, who should be permitted to guide
their policies, subject only to the ulti-
mate control of the regents, which
should naturally be exercised only on
rare occasions and under competent ad-
vice. We should like to see the Smith-
sonian Institution itself devoted to the
broad purposes of its foundation ' the
increase and diffusion of knowledge
among men,' and under existing condi-
tions this could perhaps best be accom-
plished by some form of cooperation
and affiliation between it and the scien-
tific men and scholars of the country
and the world.

THE REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT
OF THE CARNEGIE INSTI-
TUTION

When the Carnegie Institution was
established five years ago, many Amer-
ican men of science hoped that it would
fill the position that the Smithsonian
Institution had relinquished, and be-
come a center for the higher scientific
and intellectual life of the country.
But such vague visions are difficult to
realize in concrete performance. It is
disappointing that the Carnegie Insti-
tution has been able to do nothing be-
yond making grants to certain scientific
men and founding certain research in-
stitutions along well-established lines,
but it may none the less be difficult to
say what else it could do to better
advantage. Money spent on scientific
research is almost surely well spent.
If the undertakings of the Carnegie
Institution are what in commercial life
would be called three-per-cent. invest-
ments, in science they bring a material
return manyfold as large, and the ideal
results are not to be measured.

It is somewhat surprising, therefore,
to read in the report of President Wood-
ward that " after careful examination
of the facts at hand I think it safe to
state that no direct return may be
anticipated from more than half of the

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

287

small grants made up to the present .
time for minor researches and for re-
search assistantships." There are given
in the report the names of forty indi-
viduals and institutions which have
received minor grants and of six re-
search assistants, and they appear to
be of about the same standing and
largely the same individuals as those
who have received grants in previous
years. It is not easy to decide which
grants the president refers to in his
report, as it might be supposed that
every one of them would yield direct
returns. The grantees include many
of our most eminent men of science,
such as Professors S. Newcomb, W. W.
Campbell, L. Boss, A. A. Noyes, T. W.
Richards, T. C. Chamberlin, R. S. Chit-
tenden, E. L. Mark and E. B. Wilson,
and it is inconceivable that money en-
trusted to them would not be spent to
advantage. It is, however, possible
that equally good results would have
been obtained if twenty of the grants
had been distributed by lot among
members of the National Academy of
Sciences and the other twenty among
the fellows of the American Associa-
tion, and this would have obviated the
suspicion of favoritism and indirect in-
fluence which is almost inevitable when
such largesses depend mainly on the
decision of a single individual.

The president recommends that in
general minor grants shall be given
only to eminent investigators who shall
for the time become research associates
and advisers of the institution. That
the institution needs a board of scien-
tific men is obvious. Its trustees, as
is usual in America, consist mainly of
prominent men of affairs, most of
whom are too busy to give attention to
the control of the institution, even if
they were competent to do so. The sec-
retary, originally an eminent resident
man of science, is now a business man
of New York City. The by-laws speak
of special advisers and advisory com-
mittees, but if such exist they are not
mentioned in the annual report. The
only possible reference in the by-laws

to the scientific men who should be the
institution is a clause to the effect
that the president ' shall have power
to remove and appoint subordinate em-
ployees.' If the trustees could fulfil
their proper function in the care of the
property, and the president could be a
constitutional executive officer, and
there were a legislative board consist-
ing of scientific men, elected by the
scientific bodies of the country, a great
advance in organization would be ef-
fected. Perhaps we may hope that the
advisers nominated by the president
may ultimately become a board of this
character.

The larger projects of the institu-
tion last year were: botanical research,
D. T. MacDougal, director; economics
and sociology, Carroll D. Wright, di-
rector; experimental evolution, Charles
B. Davenport, director; historical re-
search, J. F. Jameson, director; horti-
culture, Luther Burbank; marine biol-
ogy, A. G. Mayer, director; meridian
astrometry, Lewis Boss, director; nu-
trition, F. G. Benedict, R. H. Chitten-
den, L. B. Mendel and T. B. Osborne;
solar physics, George E. Hale, director;
terrestrial magnetism, L. A. Bauer,
director; work in geophysics, F. D.
Adams, G. F. Becker, A. L. Day. For
these departments the sum of $552,000
was appropriated, the largest grants
being: Solar Observatory, $150,000;
geophysical research, $115,500, and
terrestrial magnetism, $54,000. Ap-
pended to the president's report are
extremely interesting accounts of the
research work accomplished under the
large projects and minor grants. Illus-
trations showing the site of the solar
observatory and the laboratories for
experimental and marine biology are
here reproduced.

MR. ROCKEFELLER'S GIFT TO

THE GENERAL EDUCATION

BOARD

Mb. John D. Rockefeller has an-
nounced his intention to give, not later
than April 1, securities valued at about

288

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

$32,000,000, to the General Education
Board, which he had previously en-
dowed with $11,000,000. The letter an-
nouncing this gift, read at a meeting
of the board on February 7, is as fol-
lows:

New York, Feb. 6, 1907.
General Education Board,

54 William Street,
New York City.

Gentlemen: My father authorizes me
to say that on or before April 1, 1907,
he will give to the General Education
Board income-bearing securities, the
present market value of which is about
thirty-two million dollars ($32,000,-
000), one third to be added to the per-
manent endowment of the board, two
thirds to be applied to such specific
objects within the corporate purposes
of the board as either he or I may,
from time to time, direct; any remain-
der not so designated at the death of
the survivor to be added also to the
permanent endowment of the board.
Very truly,

John D. Rockefeller, Jr.

The board has acknowledged this
great gift in the following terms:

The General Education Board ac-
knowledges the receipt of the communi-
cation of February 6, 1907, from Mr.
John D. Rockefeller, Jr., a member of
this body, announcing your decision to
give to the board for the purpose of its
organization, securities of the current
value of $32,000,000. The General Ed-
ucation Board accepts this gift with a
deep sense of gratitude to you and of
responsibility to society. This sum,
added to the $11,000,000 which you
have formerly given to this board,
makes the General Education Board
the guardian and administrator of a
total trust fund of $43,000,000.

This is the largest sum ever given
by a man in the history of the race
for any social or philanthropic purpose.
The board congratulates you upon the
high and wise impulse which has
moved you to this deed, and desires to
thank you, in behalf of all educational
interests whose developments it will
advance, in behalf of our country whose
civilization for all time it should be
made to strengthen and elevate, and in
behalf of mankind everywhere, in whose
interests it has been given and for
whose use it is dedicated.

The administration of this fund en-
tails upon the General Education Board
the most far-reaching responsibilities
ever placed upon any educational or-
ganization in the world. As members
of the board, we accept this responsi-
bility, conscious alike of its difficulties
and its opportunities.

We will use our best wisdom to
transmute your gift into intellect and
moral power, accounting it a supreme
privilege to dedicate whatever strength
we have to its just use in the service
of men.

The work of the General Education
Board has in the main been confined
to gifts to certain denominational col-
leges on condition that they collect
three times the amount appropriated,
but the present gift is not limited to
higher education. It is said that agri-
cultural education in the south will be
especially assisted. It will be observed
that Mr. Rockefeller and his son re-
serve the right to dispose of two thirds
of the capital in accordance with the
purposes of the board. This is a wise
provision, as the money would probably
be of greatest use if distributed to as-
sist existing institutions without other
conditions than their deserts, or to
establish new institutions. A central-
ized control of higher education, how-
ever indirect, has dangers as well as
advantages.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS

M. Chauveau, of the section of agri-
culture, has been elected president of
the Paris Academy of Sciences to suc-
ceed M. Poincare1, of the section of
mathematics. — Professor Ernest W.
Brown, who this year goes from Haver-
ford College to Yale University, has
been awarded the Adams prize of Cam-
bridge University, for his work on the
motion of the moon.— Professor William
James, of Harvard University, our most
eminent student of philosophy and psy-
chology, celebrated his sixty-fifth birth-
day on January 11, and retired on Jan-
uary 22 from the active work of his
chair.

VOL. LXX. — 18.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

APRIL, 1907

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA1
Benjamin Franklin

By Dr. S. WEIR MITCHELL

PHILADELPHIA, PA.

TTTE are here, as I understand, to unveil memorial busts of Amer-
icans distinguished in science. I, Sir, am honored by the
privilege of speaking of Benjamin Franklin. This man, the father
of American Science, was possessed of mental gifts unequaled in his
day. Even yet he holds the highest place in the intellectual peerage
of a land where, in his time, men had few interests which were not
material or political. But no man entirely escapes the despotic in-
fluences of his period. Thus in every life there are unfulfilled possi-
bilities, and so it was that, paraphrasing Goldsmith, we may say that
Franklin to country gave up what was meant for mankind, when
with deep regret he resigned, in middle life, all hope of whole-souled
devotion to science. When most productive his scientific fertility was
the more remarkable because of the other forms of dutiful activity
which in a life that knew no rest left small leisure for those hours
of quiet thought without which science is unfruitful of result.

1 There were unveiled at the American Museum of Natural History, New
York City, on December 29, ten marble busts of American men of science,
designed by Mr. William Couper and presented by Mr. Morris K. Jesup, the
president of the museum. The occasion was arranged in honor of the American
Association for the Advancement of Science and the affiliated societies meeting
at the time in New York City. The exercises took place in the presence of a
distinguished audience that crowded the large lecture hall of the museum.
By the courtesy of the director of the museum, Dr. Hermon C. Bumpus, we are
able to print here the addresses given in connection with the unveiling and
photographs of the busts. — Editor.

292 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

There is a Hall of Fame not built by the hand of man. It is the
memory of mankind. In many of its galleries this man's bust could
with justice be placed. Diplomacy would claim him as of her greatest.
For him would be the laurel of administrative wisdom. Among states-
men he would be welcomed; and who of the masters of English prose
shall in that hall of fame be more secure of grateful remembrance,
and who more certain of a place among men of science.

As an investigator of nature and of nature's laws he is materially
represented here by right of eminent achievement. Let us as men
of science feel proud that Franklin's fame as a philosopher did much
to win for Franklin the diplomatist such useful consideration and re-
spect as led to final success.

Many of those you honor to-day had moral and temperamental pe-
culiarities which more or less influenced their lives and are common
to men of science. Most of them cared little about making money;
still less about keeping it. Franklin, on the contrary, dreaded poverty;
was careful in business, made fruitful investments and died rich;
nevertheless, like the typical man of science, he refused to make money
out of his discoveries, or by patents to protect his inventions. In him
the man of science, unselfish, free from money greed, seemed to exist
apart from all those other men who went to the making of the many-
minded Franklin. In another way he was singularly unlike such
typical men of science as Henry, in physics, and Leidy, in natural
history. When Franklin made a discovery his next thought was as
to what practical use it could be put. If he made some novel ob-
servation of nature, he asked himself at once how he could make it
serve his fellow men. The great reapers of the harvest of truth com-
monly leave the inventor to make practical use of their unregarded
thought.

Leaving the wide land to do justice to Franklin, the model citizen
and great diplomatist, here we crown him with the assured verdict of
posterity Franklin, the man of pure science. Here we welcome him
to this goodly fellowship of those who communed with nature and
read the secrets of the Almighty Maker.

Alexander von Humboldt

By Baron SPECK VON STERNBURG

GERMAN EMBASSY, WASHINGTON, D. C.

In this immortal man, whose bust you have gathered to unveil,
the world reveres its greatest master since the days of Aristotle. His
genius covered all that man ever thought, did and observed in nature.
There is no branch of human knowledge into which his mind did not

294 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

penetrate. His Cosmos, that marvelous monument of meditation and
research, is a new book of Genesis in which the universe mirrors itself
in all its vastness and minuteness ' from the nebulae of the stars ' —
to use his own words — ' to the geographical distribution of mosses on
granite rocks.'

By his wonderful talent of research, by his almost superhuman
power to divine eternal laws, this great interpreter of science taught
mankind how to read in the book of nature, how to understand its
great mysteries. The series of sciences, originated by this mighty
genius is, as well as the other manifold branches of science developed
by him, sufficiently known to all of you.

, In all his investigations his ultimate aim was to bring theory
into practical relation with life. Thus he not only elevated the stand-
ard of culture of the whole world by many steps, but he also became
from a practical point of view the benefactor of mankind in many
branches of common life, as trade, commerce, navigation.

He taught us how to conceive the beauty and sublimity of nature
in its every form and motion. His studies are not a matter merely of
memory and of dry meditation, to him nature was rather the inex-
haustible source of pure and deep enjoyment, by which the heart is
purified and ennobled and men are brought nearer to perfection.

It is not necessary to give you a more detailed picture of his life.
All this is so well known and so dear to the whole learned world of
America; for never has a foreign scholar been more honored in this
country than Alexander von Humboldt.

We need only recall the celebrations which took place in his memory,
both at the time of his death and on occasion of the centennial an-
niversary of his birth, when throughout all America solemn offerings
of gratitude and devotion went out to the shadow of the great dead.

Humboldt devoted five years of his life to scientific investigations
in South and Central America, in Mexico and in Cuba. He ascer-
tained the course of the greatest rivers, he climbed the summits of
mountains, where never man's foot had trod before, he studied vege-
tation, astronomical and meteorological phenomena, gathered speci-
mens of all natural products and a great deal of historical information
about the early population of these parts of the New World. It was he
that drew the first accurate maps of these regions. With almost pro-
phetic forecast of the needs of generations to come, he examined the
Isthmus of Panama and considered carefully the possibilities of estab-
lishing an interoceanic waterway.

It is well known how great an interest Alexander von Humboldt
has taken in the United States. Indeed, so strongly was he attracted
by the problems of the new-born republic that, putting aside even his
habitual scientific occupations, he devoted himself entirely for some

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 295

months to the study of the American people and the institutions of
this country.

Finally, the great scientist, he whom people call the scientific
discoverer of America, returned to his country, carrying with him a
vast store of intellectual and material treasures of science. So abun-
dant were the results reaped from his expeditions that he needed the
cooperation of the best scholars of his time to compile that great mass
of material, and to place it into proper shape and form.

Throughout his long and industrious life, Alexander von Hum-
boldt has ever retained his love and devotion for the country where
his great field of labor lay, and for its people to whom he always
felt so closely connected by his love for freedom in thoughts and for
liberty. It is a well-known fact that in his later days of all foreign
people who ever knocked at his door no one was more heartily wel-
comed than the American citizen.

The benefits of his investigations in America returned to that
country in the course of time. No wonder that her people recognize
him as their benefactor. Another great man, whose monument will
be unveiled to-day, and most deservedly placed beside the one of Alex-
ander von Humboldt, Louis Agassiz, says of him : " To what degree
we Americans are indebted to von Humboldt, no one knows who is
not familiar with the history of learning and education in this country.
All the fundamental facts of popular education in physical science
beyond the merest elementary instruction, we owe to him," and at
another place : " Let us rejoice together that Humboldt's name will
permanently be connected with education and learning in this country,
for the prospects and institutions of which he felt so deep and so affec-
tionate a sympathy."

Of all the tributes that have been paid to Alexander von Humboldt
the latest and most fitting has now found its expression in this build-
ing. For here, in this magnificent Museum of Natural History, the
ideal aim of all his theories is realized most perfectly : to cultivate
the love of nature, and thus to ennoble man and beautify his life.

Gentlemen, permit me to thank you for the honor you have clone
me to-day, and to express the hope that this splendid building may
become a shrine of pilgrimage for scientists and students also of the
Old World, helping to bind the nations closer together.

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 297

John Torre y

Dr. N. L. BRITTON

DIRECTOR OF THE NEW YORK BOTANICAL GARDEN

As a pioneer of American botany, John Torrey naturally finds a
place among the men whose works we gladly celebrate to-day, in this
grand institution, developed in the city where he was born, where he
resided the greater part of his life, and where he died. To-day's
recognition of Torrey as a master of botanical science is, therefore,
peculiarly appropriate in New York, where he is already commem-
orated by the society which bears his name, by the professorship in
Columbia University named in his honor, and by ids botanical collec-
tions and library deposited by Columbia University at the New York
Botanical Garden.

Dr. Torrey was born on August 15, 1796, and died March 10, 1873,
nearly thirty-four years ago ; the pleasure of his personal acquaintance
is, therefore, known to but few persons now living; we have abundant
evidence, however, that he was honored and beloved to a degree ex-
perienced by but few; righteousness was instinctive in him, aid to
others was his pleasure, he was tolerant and progressive, and his genial
presence was a delight to his associates.

He was educated for the profession of medicine, graduating from
the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1818, but soon abandoned
it and in 1824 became professor of chemistry at West Point; after
ihree years service there, he was elected professor of chemistry and
botany in the College of Physicians and Surgeons, a position which
he held for nearly thirty years, during part of this period lecturing on
chemistry also at Princeton ; he was also United States assayer in New
York from 185-1 until his death.

Dr. Torrey's attention was directed to botany during his youthful
association with Professor Amos Eaton, and his interest in that science
subsequently stimulated during his medical studies by the lectures of
Professor David Hosack. It early became his favorite study, and, not-
withstanding his noteworthy services to chemistry, his fame rests on
his botanical researches, although they were accomplished durng his
hours of rest and recreation, and largely during the night.

His botanical publications began in 1819 with ' A Catalogue of
Plants Growing Spontaneously within Thirty Miles of the City of
Xew York,' published by the Lyceum of Natural History, now the
New York Academy of Sciences, and were completed the year after
his death in the ' Phanerogamia of Pacific North America,' in Vol. 17
of the Eeport of the United States Exploring Expedition. His con-
tributions to botany include over forty titles, many of them volumes
requiring years of patient study; they throw a flood of light on the

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 299

plants of North America, and form a grand contribution to knowledge.
His collections, on which these researches arc based, were annotated
and arranged by him with scrupulous care and exactness, and are
treasured as among the most important of all scientific material in
America.

Joseph Henry

By Dr. ROBERT S. WOODWARD

THE CARNEGIE INSTITUTION

This time, one hundred years ago, Joseph Henry, whose name and
fame we honor to-day, was a lad seven years of age. He was born at
Albany, New York, of Scotch parentage, his grandparents on both
sides having come from Scotland in the same ship to the Colony of
New York, in 1775.

Doubtless he had himself in mind when in his mature years he
affirmed that " The future character of a child, and that of a man
also, is in most cases formed probably before the age of seven years."
At any rate, he found himself early, for at the age of sixteen he had
determined to devote his life to the acquisition of knowledge. Thus
be became, in turn, student, teacher, civil engineer in the service of his
native state, professor of mathematics and natural philosophy in the
Albany Academy, professor of natural philosophy in the College of
New Jersey — now Princeton University — and a pioneer investigator
and discoverer of the first order before he was thirty-three years of age.

His inventions and discoveries in electromagnetism especially art
of prime importance. They include the inventions of the electro-
magnetic telegraph and the electromagnetic engine, and the discovery
of many of the recondite facts and principles of electromagnetic science.

From the age of thirty-three, when he took up the work of his pro-
fessorship at Princeton, till the age of forty-seven, when he was called
to the post of secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, he pursued his
original investigations with untiring zeal and with consummate experi-
mental skill and philosophic insight. It was during this period that
Henry and Faraday laid the foundations for the recent wonderful
developments of electromagnetic science. The breadth as well as the
depth of Henry's learning is indicated by the fact that he found time
during this busy period for excursions and for lectures in the fields
of architecture, astronomy, chemistry, geology, meteorology and min-
eralogy, in addition to his lectures and researches in physics.

He was a man rich in experience and ripe in knowledge when, in
1846, he assumed the administative duties implied by the bequest of
James Smithson. " To found at Washington, under the name of the

300 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Smithsonian Institution an Establishment for the increase and diffusion
of knowledge among men." Henceforth, for thirty-two years, until
his death in 1878, he devoted his life to the public service, not alone
of our own country, but of the entire civilized world. In this work
be manifested the same creative capacity that had distinguished his
earlier career in the domain of natural philosophy. He became an
organizer and a leader of men. To his wise foresight we owe not only
the beneficent achievements of the Smithsonian Institution itself, but
also, in large degree, the correspondingly beneficent achievements of
the Naval Observatory, the Coast and Geodetic Survey, the Weather
Bureau, the Geological Survey, the Bureau of Fisheries and the
Bureau of American Ethnology; for to Henry, more than to any other
man, must be attributed the rise and the growth in America of the
present public appreciation of the scientific work carried on by gov-
ernmental aid.

We may lament, with John Tyndall, that so brilliant an investi-
gator and discoverer as Henry should have been sacrificed to become
so able an administrator. And American devotees to mathematico-
physical science may be pardoned for entertaining an elegaic regret
that Henry as a pioneer in the fields of electromagnetism did not have
the aid of a penetratng mathematical genius, as Faraday had his
Maxwell. But posterity, just in its estimtes towards all the world,
will recognize in Henry, as we have recognized in our earlier hero,
Benjamin Franklin, a many-sided man — a profound student of nature;
a teacher whose moral and intellectual presence pointed straight to
the goal of truth; an inventor who dedicated his inventions immedi-
ately to the public good; a discoverer of the permanent lawTs which
reign in the sphinx-like realm of physical phenomena; an adminis-
trator and organizer of large enterprises which have yielded a rich
fruitage for the enlightenment and for the melioration of mankind;
a leader of men devoted to the progress of science; a patriot, friend
and counsellor of Abraham Lincoln in the darker clays of the republic
— in short, an exemplar for his race, a man whose purity and nobility
are here fitly symbolized in enduring marble for our instruction and
guidance and for the instruction and the guidance of our successors in
the centuries to come.

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 301

John James Audubon

By Dr. C. HART MEHRIAM

U. S. BIOLOGICAL SURVEY

Of the naturalists of America no one stands out in more picturesque
relief than Audubon, and no name is clearer than his to the hearts of
the American people.

Born at an opportune time, Audubon undertook and accomplished
one of the most gigantic tasks that has ever fallen to the lot of one man
to perform. Although for years diverted from the path nature in-
tended him to follow, and tortured by half-hearted attempts at a com-
mercial life, against which his restive spirit rebelled, he finally, by the
force of his own will, broke loose from his bondage and devoted the
remainder of his days to the grand work that has made his memory
immortal.

His principal contributions to science are his magnificent series
of illustrated volumes on the birds and quadrupeds of North America,
his Synopsis of Birds and the Journals of his expeditions to Labrador
and to the Missouri and Yellowstone rivers.

The preparation and publication of his elephant folio atlases of
life-size colored plates of birds, begun in 1827 and completed in 1838,
with the accompanying volumes of text (the ' Ornithological Biog-
raphy,' 1831-1839), was a colossal task. But no sooner was it accom-
plished than an equally sumptuous work on the mammals was under-
taken, and, with the assistance of Bachman, likewise carried to a
successful termination. For more than three quarters of a century
the splendid paintings which adorn these works, and which for spirit
and vigor are still unsurpassed, have been the admiration of the world.

In addition to his more pretentious works, Audubon wrote a num-
ber of minor articles and papers and left a series of Journals, since
published by his granddaughter, Miss Maria B. Audubon. The
Journals are full to overflowing with observations of value to the
naturalist, and, along with the entertaining : Episodes,' throw a flood
of light on contemporary customs and events — and incidentally are by
no means to be lost sight of by the historian.

In searching for material for his books, Audubon traveled thou-
sands of miles afoot in various parts of the eastern states, from Maine
to Louisiana; he also visited Texas, Florida and Canada, crossed the
ocean a number of times, and conducted expeditions to far-away Labra-
dor and the then remote Missouri and Yellowstone Bivers. When we
remember the limited facilities for travel in his clay — the scarcity of
railroads, steamboats and other conveniences — we are better prepared
to appreciate the zeal, determination and energy necessary to accom-
plish his self-imposed task.

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 303

That it was possible for one man to do so much excellent field work,
to write so many meritorious volumes, and to paint such a multitude
of remarkable pictures must be attributed in no small part to his rare
physical strength — for do not intellectual and physical vigor usually
go hand in hand and beget power of achievement? Audubon was noted
for these qualities. As a worker he was rapid, absorbed and ardent;
he began at daylight and labored continuously till night, averaging
fourteen hours a day, and, it is said, allowed only four hours for sleep.

In American ornithology, in which he holds so illustrious a place,
it was not his privilege to be in the strict sense a pioneer, for before
him were Vieillot, Wilson and Bonaparte; and contemporaneous with
him were Richardson, Xuttall, Maximilian, Prince of Wied, and a
score of lesser and younger lights — some of whom were destined to
shine in the near future.

Audubon was no closet naturalist — the technicalities of the pro-
fession he left to other — but as a field naturalist he was at his best and
had few equals. He was a born woodsman, a lover of wild nature in
the fullest sense, a keen observer, an accurate recorder, and, in addi-
tion, possessed the rare gift of instilling into his writings the freshness
of nature and the vivacity and enthusiasm of his own personality.

His influence was not confined to devotees of the natural sciences,
for in his writings and paintings, and in his personal contact with
men of affairs, both in this country and abroad, he exhaled the fresh-
ness, the vigor, the spirit of freedom and progress of America — and
who shall attempt to measure the value of this influence to our young
republic ?

Audubon's preeminence is due, not alone to his skill as a painter
of birds and mammals, nor to the magnitude of his contributions to
science, but also to the charm and genius of his personality — a per-
sonality that profoundly impressed his contemporaries, and which,
by means of his biographies and journals, it is still our privilege to
enjoy. His was a type now rarely met — combining the grace and cul-
ture of the Frenchman with the candor, patience, and earnestness of
purpose of the American. There was about him a certain poetic
picturesqueness and a rare charm of manner that drew people to him
and enlisted them in his work. His friend, Dr. Bachman, of Charles-
ton, tells us that it was considered a privilege to give to Audubon
what no one else could buy. His personal qualities and characteristics
appear in some of his minor papers— notably the essays entitled
' Episodes.' These serve to reveal, perhaps better than his more formal
writings, the keenness of his insight, the kindness of his heart, the
poetry of his nature, the power of his imagination, and the vigor and
versatility of his intellect.

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 305

Louis Agassiz 1

By the Rev. EDWARD EVERETT HALE
BOSTON, MASS.

I think that the first time when I ever saw Agassiz was at one of
his own lectures early in his American life. This was a description
of his ascent of the Jungfrau. I think it was wholly extempore and
though he was new in his knowledge of English, it was idiomatic and
thoroughly intelligible. At the end, as he described the last climb,
hand and foot, by which as it seems, men come to the little triangular
plane, only three feet across, which makes the summit, he quickened
our enthusiasm by describing the physical struggle by which he lifted
himself so that he could stand on this little three-foot table: He said,
' one by one we stood there, and looked down into Swisserland.' He
bowed and retired.

I know I said at once that Mr. Lowell, of our Lowell Institute,
who had * imported Agassiz' (that is James Lowell's phrase), might
have said before the audience left the hall, ' You will see, ladies and
gentlemen, that we are able to present to you the finest specimen yet
discovered of the genus homo of the species intelligens.'

And looking back half a century, on those very first years of his
life in America, I think it is fair to say that wherever he went he
awakened that sort of personal enthusiasm. And he went everywhere.
He was made a professor in Harvard College in 1848. But he never
thought of confining himself to any conventional theory of a college
professor's work. He was not in the least afraid of making science
popular. He flung himself into any or every enterprise by which he
could quicken the life of the common schools, and in forty different
ways he created a new class of men and women. Naturalists showed
themselves on the right hand and on the left. I have seen him address
an audience of five hundred people, not twenty of whom when they
entered the hall thought they had anything to do with the study of
nature. And when after his address they left the hall, all of the five
hundred were determined to keep their eyes open and to study nature
as she is. From that year 1848, you may trace a steady advance in
nature study in the New England schools.

That is to say, that his distinction is that of an educator quite as
much as it is that of a naturalist. In 1888, Lowell said, in his quarter-
millenial address at Harvard College, that the college trained no great
educator, ' for we imported Agassiz.' A great educator he truly was.

When Agassiz was appointed professor he was forty-one years old.
In my first personal conversation with him he told me a story, which

1 A letter read by Professor A. E. Verrill, of Yale University. Interesting
remarks were also made by Dr. Charles D. Walcott, Washington, D. C.
vol. lxx. — 19.

3o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

may not have got into print, of his own physical strength. He spoke
as if it were then an old experience to him. Whether he were twenty-
five or thirty-five when it happened, it shows how admirable was his
training and his physical constitution. He had been with a party of
friends somewhere in eastern Switzerland. They were traveling in
their carriages; he was on foot. They parted with the understanding
that they were to meet in the Tyrol, at the city of Innsbruck. Ac-
cordingly the next morning, Agassiz rose early and started through
the mountains by this valley and that, as the compass might direct
or his previous knowledge of the region. He did not mean to stop
for study and they did not. But he had no special plan as to which
hamlet or cottage should cover him at night. Before sundown he came
in sight of a larger town than he expected to see, in the distance, and
calling a mountaineer, he asked him what that place was. The man
said it was Innsbuck. Agassiz said that that could not be so. The
man replied with a jeer that he had lived there twenty years, and had
always been told that that was the name of the place, but he supposed
Agassiz knew better than he did. Accordingly Agassiz determined
that he would sleep there and did so. The distance was somewhere
near seventy miles. I know it gave me the impression of a walk
through the valley passes at the rate of four miles an hour, maintained
for sixteen or seventeen hours.

In later life Agassiz made to us some prophecies in which we may
trace his enjoyment of the finest physical health and strength. Health
and strength indeed belonged to everything which he said and did.

Among other things he said, twenty-five years ago, that the last
years of our century — the twentieth — would see a population of a
hundred million of people in the valleys of the upper Amazon. I like
to keep in memory this brave prophecy because I am sure it will come
true.

James Dwight Dana

By President ARTHUR T. HADLEY

YALE UNIVERSITY

It was my privilege to know James Dwight Dana intimately during
my early years. To boyhood's imagination his figure typified the man
of science; his life personified the spirit of scientific discovery. Wider
acquaintance with the world has not in any way dimmed the bright-
ness of that early impression.

The services of the geologist are to-day recognized by every one,
and sought by all who can afford them. If he would make a voyage
of exploration and discovery, the resources of the world of finance are
placed at his disposal. No such aids were given two generations ago.

3o8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

In Dana's journeyings he had to surmount hardship and peril, and
to meet the coldness of those who knew not the value of the quest
which he pursued. He and his contemporaries were like the knights
errant of chivalry, devoting their lives to an ideal. They were men
of faith, who combined the spirit of the missionary and the inspiration
of the poet with the clear vision of the observer.

The largeness of Dana's work was commensurate with the large-
ness of his inspiration. It fell to his lot not only to fill out many
pages of the record of the building of the world, as written in the
fossil life of America, but to show in important ways the methods
by which that building was accomplished. His creative brain never
rested content with mere description of facts. He had the more dis-
tinctively modern impulse to reconstruct the process by which those
facts were brought to pass. From his observations of coral islands
in the various stages of their growth he deduced a geologic principle
of world-wide importance. It is this characteristic which makes the
great modern German school of geologists headed by Suess look to
Dana as their precursor, more than to any other man of his generation.

He was not content with the work of discovery alone. The teaching
spirit was strong within him. The pioneers in science needed editors
and expositors who should make their results known. In each of these
capacities Dana's achievements were phenomenal. Of his work as
an editor, he has left the files of The American Journal of Science
as a monument. Of his work as an expositor those who have heard
his lectures and attended his class-room exercises can speak with un-
bounded enthusiasm. He was one of the rare men who by presence
and voice and manner could bring the truths and ideals of science
home even to those pupils with whom scientific study could never
be more than an incident in their lives.

But above all his works and above all his qualities stands the figure
of Dana himself — more than an explorer, more than a discoverer,
more than a teacher; his countenance, as it were, illuminated by a
touch of the light of a new day for which the world was being prepared.

His life was gentle; and the elements

So mixed in him that Nature might stand forth

And say to all the world, ' This was a man.'

Spencer Fullerton Baird

By Dr. HUGH M. SMITH
BUREAU OF FISHERIES

The life, the character, the work of Spencer Fullerton Baird
entitle him to recognition in any assemblage and on any occasion
where honor is to be paid to those who have been their county's
benefactors through illustrious achievements in science.

3io POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Developing a taste for scientific pursuits at a very early age, and
confirmed in those pursuits through the influence of friendships with
Agassiz, Audubon, Dana and other leading scientists of the time, Baird
was selected as assistant secretary of the Smithsonian Institution when
only twenty-seven years old, and there entered on a career devoted to
the promotion, diffusion, and application of scientific knowledge among
men, and marked by dignity, sound judgment, fidelity to duty, versa-
tility and general usefulness.

In the many phases of his intellectual development he resembled
Franklin and Cope; in the multiplicity of his public duties and in
the diversity of the scientific accomplishments in which he attained
eminence he had few equals; in founding, organizing and simulta-
neously directing a number of great national scientific enterprises
he was unique among those whose memory is here extolled to-day.

To render an adequate account of the branches of scientific endeavor
in which he achieved prominence, benefited his own and future gene-
rations and added to his country's renown, one would need to be an
ornithologist, a mammalologist, an ichthyologist, a herpetologist, an
invertebrate zoologist, an anthropologist, a botanist, a geologist, a
paleontologist, a deep-sea explorer, a fishery expert, a fish-culturist, an
active administrator of scientific institutions, and an adviser of the
federal government in scientific affairs; for Baird was all these and
more.

We freely acknowledge to-day the debt that science owed Baird
alive and now owes his memory, especially for his inestimable services
as assistant secretary and later as secretary of the Smithsonian Insti-
tution, as director of the National Museum, and as head of the Com-
mission of Fish and Fisheries. Among all the establishments with
which he was connected, this last was preeminently and peculiarly
his own. It was conceived by him and created for him, and it would
almost appear that he was created for it, for certainly no other person
of his day and generation was so admirably fitted for the task of
organizing this bureau and of executing the duties that grew out of its
functions as successively enlarged by congress. Insisting on scientific
investigations and knowledge as the essential basis for all current and
prospective utilitarian work, he drew around him a corps of eminent
biologists and physicists; he established laboratories; he laid plans for
the systematic study of our interior and coastal waters ; he had vessels
built that were especially designed and equipped for exploration of
the seas. While he thus inaugurated operations which have been of
lasting benefit to the fisheries, at the same time he became the foremost
promoter and exponent of marine research, and the knowledge we to-
day possess of oceanic biology and physics is directly or indirectly
due to Baird more than to any other person. The rapid development

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 311

of piscicultural science under his guidance gave to the United States
the foremost place among the nations in maintaining and increasing
the aquatic food supply by artificial means; and it was no perfunctory
tribute when, in 1880, at the International Fishery Exhibition held in
Berlin, Emperor William awarded the grand prize to Baird as ' the
first fish-culturist in the world.'

The spirit of Baird influences the Bureau of Fisheries to-day, as
it does all other institutions with which he was associated; and since
his death, nearly twenty years ago, the good that has been accomplished
in the interest of fish-culture and the fishing industry, and in the con-
duct and encouragement of scientific work, has been in consequence of
the foundations he laid, the policy he enunciated and the example
he set.

But conspicuous as were his services to science and mankind;
faithful and unselfish as was his devotion to the executive responsi-
bilities imposed on him; beautiful as was his personal character, I
conceive that his most enduring fame may result from the enthusiasm
with which he inspired others and the encouragement and opportunity
that he afforded to all earnest workers. The recipients of his aid can
be numbered by hundreds, and many of them are to-day his worthy
successors in various fields; and their places in turn will gradually
be taken by a vast number of men and women who will perpetuate
his memory by efficiently and reverently continuing his work.

This evidence of the donor's beneficence is a noble and impressive
memorial of one who merited his country's profoundest gratitude;
but the bust signifies something more, for it is a recognition of that
zeal, fidelity, self-sacrifice, intelligence and strength in the American
character so preeminently typified by Spencer Fullerton Baird.

Joseph Leidy

By Professor WILLIAM KEITH BROOKS

JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY

Joseph Leidy was born in Philadelphia, there he passed his three
score years and ten, and there he died. For forty-five years he was
an officer of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Science, and a
professor in the University of Pennsylvania for forty years. His
character was simple and earnest, and he had such a modest opinion
of his talents and of his work that the honors and rewards that began
to come to him in his younger days, from learned societies in all parts
of the world, and continued to come for the rest of his life were an
unfailing surprise to him.

His knowledge of anatomy, and zoology, and botany, and min-

PIONEERS OF SCIENCE IN AMERICA 313

eralogy was extensive and accurate and at his ready command. Farm-
ers and horticulturists came to him and learned how to check the
ravages of destructive insects; physicians sent rare or new human
parasites and were told their nature and habits and the best means
of prevention; jewelers brought rare gems and learned their value.
His comments, at the academy, on the recent additions to its collec-
tions, gave a most impressive illustration of his ready command of his
vast store of natural knowledge.

Leidy wrote no books, in the popular meaning of the word. He
undertook the solution of no fundamental problem of biology. There
are few among his six hundred publications that would attract un-
scientific readers, or afford a paragraph for a newspaper. They are
simple and lucid and to the point. Most of them are short, although
he wrote several more exhaustive monographs. They cover a wide
field, but most of them fall into a few groups. Many deal with the
parasites of mammals — among them, one in which his discovery of
Trichena in pork is recorded.

Two hundred and sixteen, or about a third of his publications,
are on the extinct vertebrates of North America. His first paper on
paleontology was published in 1846, and his last in 1888, as the sub-
ject occupied him for more than forty years. He laid, with the hand
of master, the foundation for the paleontology of the reptiles and
mammals of North America, and we know what a wonderful and in-
structive and world-renowned superstructure his successors have reared
upon his foundation. It was this work that established his fame
and brought him honors and rewards. They who hold it to be his
best title to be enrolled among the pioneers of science in America
are in the right in so far as the founder of a great department of
knowledge is most deserving of commemoration; but I do not believe
it was his most characteristic work.

I can mention but one of the results of his study of American
fossils. He showed, in 1846, that this continent is the ancestral home
of the horse, and he sketched, soon after, the outline of the story of
its evolution which later workers have made so familiar.

More than half his papers are on a subject which seems to me
to contain the lesson of his life. Like Gilbert White, he was a home-
naturalist, devoted to the study of the natural objects that he found
within walking-distance of his home, but he penetrated far deeper
into the secrets of the living world about him than White did, find-
ing new wonders in the simplest living being. In the intestine of the
cockroach and in that of the white ant, he found wonderful forests of
microscopic plants that were new to science, inhabited by minute
animals of many new and strange forms. His beautifully illustrated
memoir on A Flora and Fauna within Living Animals is one of the

3i4 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

most remarkable works in the whole field of biological literature.
Another memoir gives the results of his study of the anatomy of
snails and slugs. The inhabitants of the streams and ponds in the
vicinity of his home furnished an unfailing supply of material for re-
search and discovery, and many of his publications are on aquatic
animals. He finally became so much interested in the fresh-water
rhizopods that he abandoned all other scientific work in order to devote
all his attention to these animals. His results were published in the
memoir on The Fresh-water Rhizopods of North America. This is
the most widely known of his works. It is, and must long be, the
standard and classic upon its subject. I have no time to dwell upon
his work as the naturalist of the home — his best and most character-
istic work. Its lesson to later generations of naturalists seems to
me to be that one may be useful to his fellowmen, and enjoy the
keen pleasure of discovery, and come to honor and distinction, with-
out visiting strange countries in search of rarities, without biological
stations and marine laboratories, without the latest technical methods,
without grants of money, and, above all, without undertaking to solve
the riddles of the universe or resolving biology into physics and
chemistry.

If one have the simple responsive mind of a child or of Leidy,
he may, like Leidy, ' find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
sermons in stones, and good in everything.'

Edward Drinker Cope

By Professor HENRY FAIRFIELD OSBORN

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY AND THE AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

In the beautiful marble portrait of Edward Drinker Cope,
modeled by Mr. Couper and presented by President Jesup, you see
the man of large brain, of keen eye, and of strong resolve, the ideal
combination for a life of science, the man who scorns obstacles, who
while battling with the present looks above and beyond. The portrait
stands in its niche as a tribute to a great leader and founder of
American paleontology, as an inspiration to young Americans. In
unison with the other portraits its forcible words are : ' Go thou and do
likewise.'

Cope, a Philadelphian, born July 28, 1840, passed away at the
early age of fifty-seven. Favored by heredity, through distinguished
ancestry of Pennsylvania quakers, who bequeathed intellectual keen-
ness and a constructive spirit. As a boy of eight entering a life of
travel and observation, and with rare precocity giving promise of the
finest qualities of his manhood. Of incessant activity of mind and

316 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

body, tireless as an explorer, early discovering for himself that the
greatest pleasure and stimulus of life is to penetrate the unknown in
nature. In personal character fearless, independent, venturesome,
militant, far less of a quaker in disposition than his Teutonic fellow
citizen Leidy. Of enormous productiveness as an editor, conducting
the American Naturalist for nineteen years, as a writer leaving a shelf-
ful of twenty octavo and three great quarto volumes of original re-
search. A man of fortitude, bearing material reverses with good
cheer, because he lived in the world of ideas and to the very last
moment of his life drew constant refreshment from the mysterious
regions of the unexplored.

In every one of the five great lines of research into which he ven-
tured, he reached the mountain peaks where exploration and discovery,
guided by imagination and happy inspiration, gave his work a leader-
ship. His studies among fishes alone would give him a chief rank
among zoologists, yet among amphibians and reptiles there never has
been a naturalist who has published so many papers as Professor Cope,
while from 1868 until 1897, the year of his death, he was a tireless
student and explorer of the mammals, living and extinct. Among
animals of all these classes his generalizations marked new epochs.
While far from infallible, his ideas acted as fertilizers on the minds
of other men. As a paleontologist, enjoying with Leidy and Marsh
that Arcadian period when all the wonders of our great west were new,
from his elevation of knowledge which enabled him to survey the whole
field, with keen eye he swooped down like an eagle upon the most
important point.

In breadth, depth and range we see in Cope the very antithesis
of the modern specialist, the last exponent of the race of the Buffon,
Cuvier, Owen and Huxley type. Of ability, memory and courage
sufficient to grasp the whole field of natural history. As comparative
anatomist he ranks with Cuvier and Owen; as paleontologist with
Owen, Marsh and Leidy — the other two founders of American paleon-
tology; as natural philosopher less logical but more constructive than
Huxley. America will produce men of as great, perhaps greater,
genius, but Cope represents a type which is now extinct and never will
be seen again.

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

3X7

NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

By FRED DE LAND
PITTSBURGH, PA

VIII. Subscribers' Pioneer Telephone Equipment

TN the previous chapter it was shown how the primitive telephone
-*- set supplied to subscribers by the New Haven and other pioneer
exchanges consisted only of a mahogany or rubber magneto hand tele-
phone hung on a steel hook screwed into 'wall or board, and how the
use of the circuit-breaking push button was the approved method of
calling central. No vibrating bell was supplied to the subscriber.
When central called, attention was attracted with the aid of a buzzing,
squealing noise, that was sent through the telephone by manually and
rapidly operating a large induction coil attached to the switchboard.
That was the method in vogue early in 1878, and, as already stated,
in the beginning it was the custom to use this one-hand telephone as

Fig. 22.

transmitter and receiver, dexterously moving it from lips to ear and
from ear to lips, as the conversation progressed. From time to time
instructions were issued to subscribers on the proper use of the tele-
phone. One of the first read : ' Do not talk with your ear, or listen
with your mouth.' Where a subscriber was willing to pay for 'two
telephones,' he enjoyed the unusual convenience of following the now
common method of holding the receiver to his ear while talking into
the transmitter, as shown in Fig. 22. Not many duplicate telephones

318 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

were installed, but occasionally an editor would consider his time of
sufficient value to justify the increased outlay of $10 a year for a
( second telephone.'

Following the now famous experiments with his telephones at the
Centennial, Alexander Graham Bell had displaced the parchment or
membrane diaphragm with one of iron, and brought out the wooden
hand telephone to take the place of the oblong box, so inconvenient
for general use. Then, in December, 1877, a few long rubber-encased
hand telephones similar in form to the present receiver were sent out
to several exchanges as an experiment. On July 1, 1878, Mr. Coy
had 230 mahogany hand telephones, about 100 rubber hand telephones

Fig. 23.

and a dozen box telephones. But this rubber hand telephone did not
go into general use until the summer of 1878, and, in some exchanges,
never really supplanted the original wooden hand telephone, the earlier
magneto sets doing so.

Meanwhile an improved form of the oblong box telephone, shown
in a previous chapter, was brought out in June, 1877, but met with
no favor, as it also required a table or a shelf for its support in a
horizontal position. In August, 1877, came the first of the oblong
box telephones remodeled so as to be fastened to the wall in a vertical
position (Fig. 23). The only telephone circuits in those days were
private and social lines, the first commercial exchange opening in
January, 1878, and users of projected private lines did not take kindly
to this innovation, preferring to have the more convenient hand tele-
phone which could so easily be shifted from lips to ear. And this was
the prevailing sentiment even after exchanges were in operation. Thus
this upright form of box telephone did not come into general use
until the winter of 1878-79, when it served only as part of a sub-
scriber's set.

In the autumn of 1878, the parent Bell company brought out the
first of the many forms of magneto bell telephone sets. This early
type of wall set (Fig. 24) had the rubber-encased hand telephone
hung from a hook projecting through the door on the front of the
box. The attaching of two hand telephones to the magneto to serve

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

3l9

as transmitter and receiver (Fig. 25) naturally followed. The intro-
duction of this magneto ringing device displaced the circuit-breaking
push-button method of calling central, and the single-stroke bell as
part of the subscriber's equipment. It also enabled the local com-

CROUNO

LINE

Fig. 24.

Fig. 25.

panies to secure more equitable rates by increasing the rental where
the new equipment was installed.

In the pioneer days when local rates ranged from $18 to $36 per
year, nearly all the subscribers were on party-lines, and few lines
carried less than twelve telephones. ' How many boxes are there on
your line ? ' was a question often asked by subscribers in the days
when it was not unusual to have twelve, or even twenty or more sub-
scribers on a grounded iron-wire circuit in towns. In May, 1878, it
was stated that one circuit had ' fifty-six instruments, and conversa-
tion is carried on with perfect ease.' Another town boasted of forty-
three telephones on one line. Naturally there was more or less eaves-
dropping, with the usual entailed bitterness. Thus the parent com-

32°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

pany found it advisable to sanction the addition of a secrecy-switch
to the magneto bells supplied by the different manufacturers. One
form of this lock-out switch is shown on the front of the magneto
box in Fig. 25. Kemoving the receiver or hand telephone from the
box caused the latter to fly up, just as the hook on the side of the
modern telephone does. If the subscriber desired to converse with
some one on the line to the right of his telephone, he would turn the
switch to the right, thus shutting out all subscribers to the left, but
still leaving it possible for eavesdroppers on the right to listen in.
If the switch was turned to the left, the subscribers to the right were
cut out. To operate the bell it was only necessary to turn the crank
at a moderate speed and at the same time to press the button under-
neath the box the number of times that corresponded with the number
of rings required to call the given station.

The next change came in the adoption of the first of the vertical
boxes as a transmitter in connection with the magneto-call bell, and
the use of the hand telephone as a receiver. In method of operation
both instruments were identical, either could be used as transmitter
or receiver, and both were fastened to the wall side by side (Fig. 26).
The approved method of calling then in vogue is also shown (Fig. 27).
The circular of instructions sent out with this early wall set read :

LINE

Fig. 26.

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE 321

UMi

Fig. 27.

A person is shown (Fig. 28) talking to a box telephone, keeping a hand
telephone pressed against his ear. It is evident that he can talk or listen with-
out removing either instrument, and consequently can carry on a conversation
with as much ease and rapidity as if in the presence of the other person. If he
is in a noisy place he can, in listening, turn his other ear to the box telephone,
thereby hearing what is said with increased loudness, and at the same time
shutting out external sounds. All the telephones described above do not require
any battery whatever, and for ordinary purposes are all that can be desired,
both for loudness and distinctness.

By reason of its simplicity of operation, the ' push-button mag-
neto' (Fig. 29) type of instrument was popular during its brief
existence. In construction and operation it materially differed from
the crank instrument. In the latter, the current followed the re-
volving of an armature within a magnetic field; in the former, the
current was produced by pushing the button on the face of the instru-
ment, thus ' forcibly detaching a soft iron armature from the poles
of a permanent magnet surrounded with coils of insulated wire.' The
following instructions were sent with this instrument in 1880:

To signal the central office, press the black knob firmly twice, turn the
switch so as to cut out the stations on the same line beyond, then place the
telephone to the ear. If there are two black knobs on the instrument, one above

vol. lxx. — 20.

■*22

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the other, press the upper one steadily while pushing the lower one. If the line
is not being used, your bell will ring every time you press the lower knob.
If the line is in use, your bell will not ring. As soon as you hear the op-
erator, give him your name and the name of the person to whom you wish to
speak; then replace the telephone on the hook. When the person called for is
connected with your wire, your bell will ring. Be sure, on removing the tele-
phone again, to turn the hook switch as before, unless notified by the central
office to turn in an opposite direction. When you are notified by the central
office that a person wishes to speak to you, keep the telephone at your ear, as
the person will be ready to speak as soon as you are notified.

Owing to the rapidity with which improvements and modifications
in equipment appeared during the first five years, rarely did the sub-
scribers in any two exchanges have the same type of instruments, the
newer exchanges having the later types except where the most rigid
economy was practised. Yet it often happened that when the patrons
in one town learned that the subscribers in an adjoining town had a
later type of instruments, the local owners were given no rest until
up-to-date instruments were installed, even though the equipment
declared to be antiquated and obsolete had been in use only from
twelve to eighteen months.

UN £

Fig. 28.

DEVELOPMENT IN TELEPHONE SERVICE

323

Fig. 29.

Of course, the parent company, through its earnest efforts to afford
the operating companies every serviceable improvement, was indirectly
responsible for this unavoidable variance in subscriber-equipment. And
while modifications in form and improve-
ment in workmanship were not patentable,
they were the result of careful and costly
experiments in the course of which the parent
company was ' obliged to withdraw from use
and condemn many thousands of instruments,
not because they were inoperative, but because
others were better.' Transmitters and re-
ceivers were kept in good condition by the
parent company, and replaced with new or
improved types as often as necessary with-
out expense to the local company. But the
remainder of the equipment had to be pur-
chased from such manufacturers as were able to supply it. Hence,
to displace old with new equipment was often a costly change for the
local company.

In commenting on the trouble caused by defective telephone cords,
the Committee on Telephone Supplies reported at the fourth conven-
tion (1882) that

while the telephone business has been one marked with progress, we have to
confess that in this respect we have progressed but slowly, if at all. We have
had cords of all styles, of all sizes, and constructed of all metallic material from
the ' Gold Foil ' to the ' Steel Spiral ' ; from the large and unwieldy to the small
and ductile. We have had ' tips ' with shields, ' tips ' with spirals, and ' tips '
without name. We have had forms of eyelets through which the cord is threaded
and wrapped with linen. We have had variegated colors from the serpentine
braid to the pale blue and the ' polka dot.' We have had all forms but the
good. ... A cord is wanted that will not ravel at the ends, thus causing ' cut-
outs ' in subscribers' conversations. A greater degree of perfection is required
in fastening the tips. They should be light in weight and free from kinks
or twists.

In 1883, Mr. C. N. Fay said:

The first magneto bells we had (in Chicago) came from Boston and were
manufactured by Williams, four years ago, and they were certainly the best, so
far as lasting qualities were concerned. The next bells we bought, in the fall of
1879, were the first bells Gilliland made. Bells that come in under two years
are not worn out, but there is some defect which requires repairing, and then
the bell can be put back in service. . . . Their life will not be over four years.
If they are not worn out, the dust and the battering they get and the general
abuse they receive from subscribers makes them practically worthless after a
time, and the subscriber says : ' I won't have that thing on my wall.' We have
got to count upon replacing our entire stock of magneto bells about once in
every four years.

In one way it "was encouraging to the owners of the pioneer local
plants to perceive how rapidly the list of subscribers increased. In

324 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

another way this unexpectedly rapid growth was depressing in char-
acter, because it had not been anticipated and consequently the plant
had not been constructed on corresponding lines. Where the invest-
ment was not of a speculative nature, but made on a permanent basis,
the owners soon realized that they had not been just to themselves
nor to the public in building so cheaply and so sparingly. Again, the
funds necessary to meet these constantly changing conditions were not
readily forthcoming, for not one in ten of the pioneer organizations
earned dividends prior to 1882.

In 1880, the parent Bell company gave this sensible advice to its
operating companies:

Don't expect people to ' study up ' the instruments themselves, but have
them explained politely and patiently. Some large exchanges publish a monthly
pamphlet containing corrected lists of subscribers, new information, etc., and
defray the whole or part of the expense of its publication by accepting adver-
tisements for alternate pages. A pamphlet issued in this way costs little or
nothing, and its monthly coming is appreciated by subscribers. Don't forget
that the local papers are a valuable means of popularizing your business.
Advertise in them as much as circumstances demand and warrant.

The parent company also stated that printed lists of subscribers
should be prepared in ' form like a dancing programme.' Inciden-
tally it may be added that current subscribers' directories in cities like
Pittsburgh now weigh about three pounds each, while the directory
used in New York City weighs nearly twice as much. The latter con-
tains the names of more than three hundred thousand individuals or
firms and about four hundred thousand copies of each issue are dis-
tributed. Owing to the frequent revision of Bell subscriber-lists these
' dancing-programmes ' are admittedly the most reliable directories in
the cities.

Although Graham Bell's hand telephone transmitted messages with
remarkable clearness, even over long distances where no disturbing
causes interfered, yet it did not possess sufficient power to satisfac-
torily serve under the varied conditions that developed as the scope
of telephone service expanded in all directions. Even though there
were no electric-light circuits and no trolley lines, the inductive effect
and the zone of noise was always in evidence; for telegraph lines par-
alleled many telephone circuits and, as practically all lines were
grounded, the effect of earth currents was often plainly perceptible.
So sensitive was the telephone found to be, that scientists employed
it in delicate researches to detect the flow of electrical currents so
minute as to be inappreciable to all other instruments. And Graham
Bell stated that in standing on a large board placed on his lawn, if
a single spear of grass came in contact with his foot while experi-
menting with his telephone, the effect of ground currents was instantly
perceptible, yet disappeared the moment the connection was broken
between shoe and grass.

ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF MOSQUITOES 325

THE GENERAL ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF MOSQUITOES1

By Professor JOHN B. SMITH

RUTGERS COLLEGE, NEW BRUNSWICK

~VTO one should be better qualified than a Jerseyman to speak on
-^ this subject, for no state in the union has suffered more in repu-
tation and in arrested prosperity from mosquitoes than New Jersey.

During the four or five years last past, I have had opportunity to
observe conditions closely, and there is not a section whose develop-
ment has not been in some way affected by this insect pest.

First: by the carriage of malarial disease, and by the term car-
riage, I mean, of course, not the direct transmission from one indi-
vidual to another, but that service as intermediate host in the develop-
ment of the parasitic organisms that cause the disease.

Anopheles occurs throughout our state, although the A. maculi-
pennis, which is the only one of our species known to be affected by
the parasite, is comparatively rare and is, curiously enough, more
abundant in the more northern, hilly portions than in the southern
lowlands, where breeding places are more numerous.

Malarial diseases are much less common with us than they were a
few years past, and that is due partially to the improvement of sani-
tary conditions which lessens mosquito breeding in densely populated
districts, and partly to the much more thorough treatment which a
patient now receives from the attending physician.

It requires the presence of a patient infested with the plasmodium,
as well as of the proper species of Anopheles, to start an epidemic of
malaria, but the mosquitoes need not be at all common to make
trouble. I have in mind an instance very much in point: A village
of high-class residences, well-located, generally healthy and where mos-
quitoes were accounted among the rarities; but, as it happened, the
few that did occur were A. maculipennis. Into that community, where
no case of malaria had ever been known, was introduced a gang of
Italian laborers, recent immigrants, it was later found, and most of
whom had been affected with the fever in Italy.

Before the end of the season a considerable number of cases of
the sestivo-autumnal variety had developed in the village and some of
them of the most severe type. This led to a search for the cause,
and the breeding places for the few mosquitoes that occurred were
located and abolished. Italian laborers have been tabooed in that

326 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

locality since then, and for the two years last past no further case has
developed, so far as I have been able to find.

The agency of mosquitoes in the transmission of other febrile
diseases is so definitely established that their economic importance
as a menace to public health can not be doubted. Their agency in a
number of other diseases is suspected with good reason. In New
Jersey a recent amendment to the general health law classifies ' waters
in which mosquito larvae breed' among the nuisances over which local
boards of health have summary jurisdiction, and we have the fullest
powers under our law for dealing with the mosquito pest. Action
under those powers is not yet the rule, but each year sees a greater
advance in this direction.

The great bulk of the mosquitoes occurring in this section of our
country are not agents for the transmission of any disease known to
us; but their attacks may be, and often are, so annoying as to form
a positive injury to the health of weak or sickly individuals by robbing
them of sleep and by the constant irritation of their bites. To some
persons the bite of a mosquito is really a serious matter and severe
swelling and inflammatory conditions are caused. To nobody is it a
pleasure to be bitten, and there is no point of view from which the
insect is not a detriment to health and the pursuit of happiness.

Second: the influence on the agricultural development of an in-
fested area. This is a point that is rarely referred to, and it is not
realized that the character of a farming district may be substantially
modified by mosquitoes. Dairying, or supplying milk for the markets
of New York, Philadelphia and our own cities, is a very important
industry in New Jersey, and a large portion of the Philadelphia supply
comes from the southern part of that state. We have a stretch of land
in one of these southern counties eminently adapted for dairying, and
where herds have been in times past established again and again; but
they never lasted long, simply because the incessant attacks by swarms
of mosquitoes reduce the yield as well as the quality of milk to such
an extent as to make the animals unprofitable. It has been necessary
to change the type of agriculture in these areas to a less profitable one
simply because of the mosquito pest.

Another section of our state, not far from the shore, is peculiarly
adapted to the growing of small fruits, particularly berries of various
kinds. These are very profitable and find a ready sale in the near-by
resorts. But just about the time when these berries ripen, the country
is apt to be flooded with swarms of mosquitoes from the salt marshes,
and when they do come it is impossible to get pickers. Gangs of Ital-
ians have been brought down from Philadelphia, they have started in

1 Read at a meeting of the American Society of Tropical Medicine, Phila-
delphia, December 7, 1906, and published under its imprimatur.

ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF MOSQUITOES 327

blithely, and by noon have given up the work and started back to the
city. Of course such conditions do not occur every year; nor do they
continue throughout the season; but they do occur often enough and
last long enough to make the farmer hesitate about putting in a crop
which he knows would pay if he got it, but which he may be compelled
to see rot on the ground because no pickers can be found to brave the
mosquito hosts. Few persons are ready to believe at a first statement
how important a factor in. the agricultural development of a region the
mosquito may become.

Third: there is the effect of the mosquito upon the availability of
a territory for development as a residential district.

This is the most important feature of the problem in New Jersey to-
day, and there is no exaggeration in the statement that the elimination
of the mosquito would add ten millions to the taxable value of real
estate in two years. Let me illustrate: New York City is a highly
desirable place of residence in winter ; but less so in summer, and there
are thousands of residents of New York City who are well able to
afford a summer home within an hour or two from town, and who are
quite willing to pay for it. New Jersey has many places ideal in
situation and accessibility, and one such place developed rapidly to a
certain point and there it stood, halted by the mosquitoes that bred in
the surrounding marsh lands. Country club, golf, tennis and other
attractions ceased to attract when attention was necessarily focussed
on the biting or singing pests that intruded everywhere, and the tend-
ency was to sell out. But the owners were not ready to quit without
a fight, and an improvement society was formed which consulted with
my office and followed my advice. In one year the bulk of the breed-
ing area was drained, mosquitoes have since been absent almost entirely ;
one gentleman, not a large owner, either, told me his property had
increased $50,000 in value, and new settlers began to come in. This
year one of the worst breeding areas of the olden day was used as a
camping ground, and 100 new residences are planned for next year.

New Jersey has miles of sea coast that is unequaled for summer
resorts. All but a few points are practically abandoned as unin-
habitable. Barnegat Bay and its surroundings constitute a fisherman's
paradise, and again and again settlements have started, done well for
a season and have been abandoned. Those who came one year never
came again, and many who came for a month stayed only a day.

, The only thing that prevents a continuous line of summer resorts
along the entire shore line is the mosquito pest, and were that removed
there would be a scramble to get land.

We may take the result on Staten Island as an example. This
Island, now a part of Greater New York, is geographically a portion
of New Jersey, separated from the mainland by a narrow stream or

328 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

'kill/ on both sides of which salt marsh flats extend for a mile or
more to the highland. The southern and eastern shore is a continua-
tion of the New Jersey coast line from the mouth of the Raritan
River, and like it has a number of indentations more or less bordered
by salt marsh areas. On all these marshes mosquitoes bred in un-
counted millions and spread throughout the island. Result: several
square miles of most desirable territory for suburban residences entirely
unsettled. There are two shore resorts, South Beach and Midland
Beach, feeble imitations of Coney Island in some directions, but more
desirable in others, that just maintained themselves despite their at-
tractions. During the day conditions were tolerable along shore, but
as soon as the sun was low in the horizon trouble began, and as it
became dusk the fight began, and pleasure seekers sought shelter
behind screens or started for home.

This past summer, under the supervision of Dr. A. H. Doty, state
quarantine officer, the salt marshes have been drained in the manner
advocated by me, and the beginning was made on the eastern and
southern shores, where Midland and South Beach are situated. I
need hardly say that very few believed in good results, and scepticism
was general even in circles where we might have expected material
support But we got the needed money, secured a contractor within
our estimate, and the eastern and southern shore work was done before
the breeding season set in.

Result: there have been very few mosquitoes of any kind, and
practically no marsh mosquitoes along this shore during the entire
season. Visitors stayed longer and came more frequently to both
beaches, which enjoyed a season of unparalleled prosperity, taxing the
full capacity of the transportation companies. As the season advanced,
the drainage work extended farther and farther away from the popu-
lated sections, permanent residents began to notice that nobody was
putting in screens, and that screened porches were never used. On the
golf links games could be carried on while the light lasted, and out-
door dinners and suppers became the rule at the Country Club. When
it was fully realized that there was practically no mosquito pest, and
the improvement in the character of the drained territory was obvious,
there was a change in public sentiment. Plans were made for extend-
ing the attractions at the beaches, and many thousands will be put into
new amusement enterprises during the present winter. Land values
stiffened and very little was offered for sale.

Two industrial enterprises decided to locate on the marsh area On
the west of the island, and these are expected to employ, respectively,
4,000, and 6,000 men, most of whom will undoubtedly settle near-by.
These enterprises will result in actually reclaiming a large section of
the marsh, which is something that mosquito drainage does not and
was not intended to accomplish.

ECONOMIC IMPORTANCE OF MOSQUITOES 329

It is fair, therefore, to consider the mosquitoes of great economic
importance, and as serious drawbacks to any community from three
points of view :

First, their influence, direct and indirect, upon the health and well-
being of the inhabitants.

Second, their influence upon the development of the agricultural
resources, preventing or limiting the profitable use of infested territory
for certain purposes.

Third, their influence upon land values due to the drawbacks men-
tioned under 1 and 2.

Having determined these points, it remains to determine whether,
in any stage, any species of mosquito is of any value to man, directly
or indirectly. The adult is a feeder upon juices of plants and animals ;
it produces nothing of use to us and removes nothing that is detri-
mental. It is of absolute importance to the continued existence of
those microzoa that pass one stage of their existence in the mosquito
body and nowhere else; but no one will argue that it is desirable to
continue these organisms, and if the destruction of the mosquito is
accompanied by the elimination of Plasmodia, Trypanosomes; Filaria
and others of similar ills, a double good will have been accomplished.

In the larval stages the species are feeders upon the microorgan-
isms, animal and vegetable, that occur in more or less stagnant waters.
In a way they are scavengers, and it can not be definitely said that they
may not destroy or limit some organisms that might otherwise be or
become harmful to man. Could it be proved then that these stagnant
water areas are necessary, it might be a question whether it is wise to
war on mosquitoes until we have a more definite knowledge of the food
of the wrigglers. But are these stagnant waters of any use to man,
and is it necessary to retain them ? On this point also it seems to me
the answer must be against the insects, leaving absolutely no evidence
that they are of any use or benefit whatever to the human race, directly
or indirectly, as larva or adult.

The legislature and governor of New Jersey are sufficiently con-
vinced of the injurious effects of the mosquito upon the development
of the state to venture an investment of $350,000 in the effort to secure
the practical elimination of the pest.

33° POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,

HOW SHALL THE DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES OF
MODEKN LIFE BE MET AND OVERCOME?

By RICHARD COLE NEWTON, M.D.

VTTHEN Bichat referred to civilization as 'nothing more than the
» » environment which tends to destroy humankind/ he had in
mind, presumably, the so-called civilization of his own time, which we
are willing to concede was considerably below that of to-day in every
respect and far below that of the Greeks and Romans. To illustrate
the superior efficiency of what we may call a natural method of treat-
ing diseases over the highly artificial and fanciful methods which pre-
vailed long after Bichat's time, an extract from Higgins's ' Humani-
culture ' may be paraphrased as follows : It is a matter of record that
Augustus Caesar recovered his health after the expedition into Spain,
when suffering from an attack of illness, said to have been due to an
inflammation of the liver, by a treatment of baths and an exclusively
vegetable diet; whereas, Louis XIV. of France, living 1,600 years
later, " in the short space of one year took 215 different medicines, 212
enemata and was bled no less than 47 times." Here is a striking
example of progression backwards. As Dr. Higgins sententiously
remarks, " A kindly historian would surely take such adverse circum-
stances into consideration when he gave his judicial opinion on the
acts of such unfortunate monarchs."

There are still those who seem to believe that every disease has its
appropriate and efficient remedy: a dogma long ago exploded. The
only certain remedy for any disease is a man's own vital power. If
the body is strong enough and well-nourished enough it will throw
off the diseased condition. Drugs, outward applications, mental or
spiritual influences, baths, regulation of the diet, ventilation and tem-
perature may be of such efficient and timely aid as to turn the tide of
battle from defeat to victory and may help nature to triumph. They,
however, are only adjuncts. The natural inherent power of the body
itself is the sine qua non, the absolute essential; without which all
therapeutic measures whatever will prove unavailing.

Admitting then that this condition of bodily vigor is necessary be-
fore we can recover from sickness, or can withstand a severe injury,
or shock, is it not possible to so train and develop the body that it
will be practically non-susceptible to illness and not only that, but so
that it will be far more efficient and enduring for all of life's work
than the non-trained or improperly developed body? There can be
only one answer to this question.

DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES OF MODERN LIFE 331

Probably the day has gone by when it is necessary to argue with
intelligent people in regard to the relationship between a man's in-
tellectual power and his bodily health and development. Had we not
the splendid example of the Greek civilization before us, we could still
reason it out from analogy and observation that a healthy mind
can not under average conditions exist outside of a healthy body. As
President Eliot has neatly put it, " The scholar must use strenuously a
tough and alert body and possess a large vitality and a sober courage."

The contempt in which bodily exercise has been held for many cen-
turies and the undue laudation of mental as opposed to physical
prowess are to a great extent at least a residuum of the reaction of the
ecclesiastical and medical superstitions of the dark ages against the
natural methods of the Greek philosophers and against what was con-
sidered a too predominant admiration for the physical as opposed to
the spiritual side of life. It seems to have been considered heathenish
to be well formed and well developed, erect of body and broad of chest.
The ideal saint was anaemic to a degree; the ideal successful lawyer or
prosperous merchant was of e full round belly with good capon lined ' ;
the ideal lady was Miss Lydia Languish with wasp-like waist and no
organs in particular. For the last half century, however, the reaction
toward universal physical prowess and bodily excellence has been
advancing, and just now with its gradually accelerated momentum it
is making wonderful progress. A great and widespread awakening is
taking place in regard to the proposition which I have laid down as
axiomatic: that there must be a synchronous and properly balanced
development of mind and body, if man is to even approximate his
glorious destiny.

Unfortunately, many of the simplest rules relating to the develop-
ment and care of the human body are as yet enveloped in mystery,
or, to speak more exactly, no two authorities seem to agree upon them.
The investigation of the regime in vogue in a number of sanatoria by
Professor Fisher has demonstrated that scarcely any two of them agree
in the diet prescribed for consumptive patients. The calorific value
of the prescribed food for each person ranges, in the different institu-
tions, between 2,000 and 5,500 calories per diem, or a difference of
250 per cent. If then in a disease which has received the great amount
of attention and study which has been bestowed upon tuberculosis,
for a number of years, and in which the modern treatment is mainly
confined to the three natural agencies of diet, fresh air and sunlight,
there is no accord amongst clinicians as to the standard diet, what
wonder is it that in other diseased conditions and more especially in
health the greatest confusion prevails in regard to the best form of
diet?

Chemical and microscopic experiments in laboratories, however im-

332 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

portant, even absolutely essential though they are, will never decide
certain vital questions. Note the fantastical deduction of Metchnikoff,
who asserts that the large intestine is really a lusus naturae, a dangerous
and disease-breeding portion of the economy which had better be dis-
pensed with, at least to the extent of a few feet. The idea does not
seem to have dawned upon him that the colon might not be dangerous
were it not overloaded with the unused products of an excessive alimen-
tation. Nor can experiments upon animals, nor investigations in the
professor's laboratory, ever determine this question, while there are
already enough isolated instances on record to render it at least ex-
tremely probable that an extended investigation of a sufficient number
of human beings would prove that the dangerous element in the life
of the modern man is not the anatomical mistake of superabundant
intestine, but the overindulgence of a pampered appetite. Nor can
a priori reasoning be depended upon to settle some very simple contro-
versies, as, for instance, that between the vegetarians and the flesh
eaters. So far as the writer knows, no reliable statistics have ever
been compiled in regard to the longevity and efficiency of either of
these classes as compared with the other. The means for settling this
important question lie ready to our hands, viz., a careful collection
and analysis of the statistics.

The question of the harmfulness or the innocuousness of tobacco
is so far from settlement that certain good authorities declare that
its use may be a cause of arterio-sclerosis, while others say that, used
in moderation, it is harmless. There is every probability that a
properly conducted questionaire would settle this moot point, and so
we might undoubtedly settle the question of the real influence of coffee
and tea upon the health, and of various articles of diet, as well as meat
and fish. Jonathan Hutchinson's contention that fish eating is the
cause of leprosy and the commonly accepted belief that beri beri is
due to eating musty rice, or even rice in good condition in undue
proportion, have an exceedingly important bearing upon the question
question of dietetics.

The United States can no longer afford to neglect the experimental
study of tropical diseases, since we are building the Panama Canal
and have vast tropical possessions in the Philippines, not to mention
Porto Eico. There is every encouragement to prosecute such researches
when we reflect upon the splendid achievements of our army surgeons,
Reed, Gorgas, Ashford, Sternberg and others. Life has been ren-
dered happier and more secure by the devoted scientific labors of these
men. Col. Giles has said, speaking of tropical diseases, in regard to
the adaptability of the English to life in India, that Clive, being a
genius, " naturally possessed the originality to modify his habits to his
new surroundings and so survived to become an empire-builder and a

DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES OF MODERN LIFE 333

hero. Nor was the case exceptional, for looking back on the history
of our great Indian dependency, one can not fail to be struck with
the high average ability of the few who survived to attain leading
positions. . . . But the rank and file, who could not or would not
learn, died off like rotten sheep." So it is to-day in all parts of the
globe and nowhere more plainly true than in the United States that
only an exceptional man, almost a genius, learns to modify his habits
and his life to his environment and to triumph over his surroundings,
his appetites and the absurd dictates of fashion. All the world over
the genius carves out his proper regime for himself, the average man,
ignorantly complaisant, indulges his appetites like the rest of his kind,
dies like a rotten sheep and leaves his life-work unfinished.

The foregoing remarks have been confined mainly to diet because
that is now the most pressing question before the people of this
country and because, as said above, it is a matter upon which the
utmost diversity of opinion exists. An observation of 10,000 people for
ten years may be necessary to settle the question of the average standard
diet for the average man at the different stages of life. If, however,
it should take ten times as long and cost an amount equal to the
national debt, it would be money and time well expended if the
question should be settled thereby. In collating vital statistics,
while the time of the death of any one man can not with certainty
be predicted, the deaths of ten thousand individuals can be fixed
with the nicest accuracy. Nothing can be asserted in regard to
the individual, but in regard to the multitude the success of the sta-
tistical method is surprising. So in the matter of the health records
of one man little can be assumed from a study of his habits; if, how-
ever, we could ascertain the life habits of 10,000 men, there is no
question but that we could establish certain important truths in regard
to them beyond all controversy. And it is equally certain that this
is the only method by which some of these truths can be established.
There is to-day absolutely nothing known about the etiology of cancer.
This dreadful and constantly increasing disease has been studied in
every way; in the individual, at the bedside, in the laboratory, in the
post-mortem room, by inoculation into animals, etc., etc., and nothing
conclusive has been discovered in regard to its causation. Had the life-
habits of 10,000 people suffering with cancer been studied as to their
diet, their occupation and surroundings, their use of alcohol, tobacco,
etc., as well as the questions of heredity, of physical development and
of the precedence of other diseased conditions in the same subject, there
can be no doubt that important and probably convincing light, would
have been shed upon the whole question. Studied in individuals, the
cause of this scourge of the race has escaped every effort to locate it;
had it been studied collectively, with a large enough number of observa-

334 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tions, its cause would probably have been discovered and its ravages
arrested. This probability becomes a certainty if the disease, as has
often been asserted, is caused by diet or by residence in certain localities.

Lacking an authoritative standard of such an apparently simple
thing as the human diet leaves the people a prey to any glib-tongued
person who has any strictly original views to advance or pet theories
to advocate. A certain magazine article which recently ridiculed most
modern theories of diet and laid special stress on pork and beans as
the ideal dietary of the vigorous and progressive, is a fair sample of
the mischievous and pseudo-scientific writing which catches the popular
eye and may do untold harm. The people deserve and should have a
dietary standard, and there should be some competent and properly-
equipped body, like the council on pharmacy and chemistry of the
American Medical Association, who will spend the necessary time and
trouble to settle the questions, not alone of the physiological diet, but
of the proper bodily exercise, of ventilation, heating, bathing, etc., etc.,
in short of personal hygiene; as well as the problems affecting the
public health, the pollution of streams and the extinction of tuber-
culosis.

Furthermore, any new system of therapeutics or any alleged new
remedy should be submitted to this body of experts for trial, and ap-
proval or condemnation, before it should be possible to advertise it
to the public. A variety of methods of treatment are from time to time
exploited and no one has the legal right to supervise them or to decide
whether, on the one hand, they can do what they are advertised to be
able to accomplish or, on the other hand, whether they can be trusted
not to harm and injure the people.

If the government can inspect food, it certainly has a right, and
should exercise it, to determine, for example, whether or not any
newly-advertised method of treatment is safe and appropriate. The
objection may be raised against such a proposition as the foregoing
that it would be an interference with the personal liberty of which
our country is so justly proud; to which the obvious reply is that it is
not suggested that any one who wishes to submit to any special course
of treatment for a particular disease should be prevented by law from
doing so, but every one has a right to know whether the claims of any
newly-advertised remedy can be substantiated. In other words, it is
no infringement of personal liberty to force a person who professes
to have a new and valuable remedy to prove that it is at least not
injurious before he shall be allowed to exploit it.

In the material world we have studied everything that grows or
exists that can be marketed or used for man's sustenance or comfort,
to extend his knowledge, beautify his home, or divert his leisure, but
man himself in his most necessary functions, to wit, as an animal,

DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES OF MODERN LIFE 335

has not been studied in any comprehensive and thorough manner, unless
we may say that the Japanese have done it, since the days of Juvenal
who gave us the immortal sentiment ' mens sana in corpore sano.'

If twentieth-century civilization is to make further advance, if our
beloved country is to be much longer inhabited by Americans, if in
short the present Anglo-Saxon race is not to die out, steps must be
taken to study the conditions of existence and ascertain what measures
must be adopted to prevent the terrible waste of human life, now going
on without let or hindrance. We are wasteful of many things, but of
nothing else are we so wasteful as of human life. And most of this
waste is entirely preventable. President Mayo said at the last meet-
ing of the American Medical Association that a sufferer from typhoid
fever has as good a right to sue the city where he contracted the
filthy complaint as though he had hurt himself by a fall on a defective
pavement, and yet we read in the newspapers of epidemics of typhoid
fever just broken out in Cincinnati, Newark and other places. Were it
outbreak of rinderpest or foot- and mouth-disease, stringent means
would be at once taken to stop it and all the forces of the government
would be enlisted to save cattle or sheep that have a market value. But
human beings may die of typhoid fever, as our soldiers did in Camp
Thomas, and no one be called to account; and yet we call ourselves a
civilized and a God-fearing nation. Verily our brother's blood shall
be required at our hands.

Lyman Abbott said in his baccalaureate sermon at Cambridge
that we are entering a period of fraternalism : " There has been
autocracy and individualism, but the new life shall be one not of
socialism, nor communism, but of fraternalism." We are the keepers
of our brother's body, his health, his happiness, his children and his
chance to develop and to work out his destiny. We can not escape this
responsibility. Knowing its duty, our government must do it and
will do it.

Does any one doubt the possible value of government interference
in the hygiene of daily life? If so, let him reflect on the diminished
death-rate from tuberculosis since the treatment of the disease by fresh
air, sunlight and an improved dietary has been so largely inaugurated.
The death-rate from this disease in the United States has fallen in
twenty years from about 40 per 10,000 of the population annually to
about 18 per 10,000, and there is every reason to believe that it can be
reduced still lower. The returns furnished in the German tuber-
culosis congress show a decrease of 38 per cent, in deaths from phthisis
in Germany since 1875. The German insurance companies from
1901 to 1905 spent over $9,000,000 in fighting the disease and in estab-
lishing thirty-six sanatoria. These sanatoria, together with strict in-
spection and enforcement of sanitary regulations in that country, are

336 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

believed to be the cause of the remarkable decrease in the mortality
from consumption.

The diseases of the circulatory and eliminative organs, of which
arterio-sclerosis may be cited as the type, are the destructive element
which bear off our brain workers and educated men many years before
their time. Does any one doubt that these men might live as long, as
happily and usefully as Carnaro did, if they will ascertain, as he did,
the physiological regime upon which their lives should be governed
and act accordingly?

See what Japan, in the science of domestic hygiene certainly the
most civilized nation on the globe, has accomplished in the few short
years between its war with China and its war with Eussia. In the
former war three Japanese soldiers died from disease to one who died
from wounds. This has been considered the average mortality rate of
modern warfare, and so strong is prejudice and so well entrenched is
error that this ratio has been looked upon as the inevitable consequence
of war, whereas in the Eusso-Japanese war, by the exercise of simple
and perfectly feasible methods, the ratio of the mortality from sickness
to that from wounds in the Japanese army assumed the proportion of
one to four and one half, a difference from the accepted ratio of almost
800 per cent. No one would have believed this possible had it not been
amply demonstrated. Suppose that an army of United States troops
was opposed to a Japanese army. It would not be necessary for the
latter to strike a blow or to fire a gun ; if they could only hold our army
in check for six months disease would do the rest. Do I say disease?
I mean the ignorance and officialism which prevents the systematic
adoption of the study of the individual soldier and the reasonable pre-
cautions which have borne such splendid results in Japan. And shall
we decline to undertake similar studies in civil life because this has not
been done heretofore? Did not Baron Takaki's epoch-making study
of the ration in the Japanese navy stamp out beri beri in that branch
of the service and enable Admiral Togo to annihilate the splendid
Eussian fleet?

We live as though we fully believed that man, of all living animals,
is exempt from natural laws or can live superior to them. Eace horses,
bullocks, poult^, are reared under the strictest rules of diet and
hygiene. Our children are left to ignorant nurses, or the divided
counsels of improperly instructed medical men. We pass laws to pre-
vent the children of the poor from working nights or in unwholesome
surroundings, and yet we allow an overcrowded a»d ill-advised system
of public instruction to seriously and sometimes fatally injure our own
children.

There is a glaring hiatus in our educational system. The only
remedy is in the proper physical education of children and the in-

DESTRUCTIVE TENDENCIES OF MODERN LIFE 337

stmction of parents and teachers in the rules of proper physiological
development. Kules for the development and classification of children
in the public schools of Chicago have, after much painstaking labor,
been pretty well worked out. These results should be collated and
compared with similar results obtained in other cities and good working
rules deduced from them for national application. Only a board of
skilled workers under national control would have the authority, the
influence and the means to formulate and apply such rules.

~No doubt this proposition will meet with opposition from the stag-
nant elements of society, known as conservative, and from scientists
falsely so-called (being in truth pedants and the greatest hinderance to
all true progress). All thinking men will agree, however, that if
such an investigation did nothing else, it would tend to develop the
physical conscience and clarify the average conception of life. Could
people generally be convinced that over-indulgence in flesh food is one
of the principal causes, not alone of early decay and death, but of the
almost unquenchable human appetite for alcohol and narcotics, an
immense stride would have been made in human progress. And it is
extremely likely that of the $600,000,000 which this country is said to
spend annually in caring for its defectives and criminals, enough could
be saved in a few years to carry on such an investigation as we have out-
lined for a lifetime. ' Science is the only true charity and the only
true remedy.' Allowing degeneration, allowing intemperance, allow-
ing immorality, gluttony and ignorance to emasculate our youth,
poison the body politic, fill our penal institutions and, worst of all,
prevent the proper development of our men and women, is race suicide
on a scale not contemplated in ordinary family life, but multiplied by
millions, and surely, unless checked, leading to national destruction
and disintegration. The remedy is a proper solution of the so-called
common questions of life : the neglected body, the despised dietetics, the
irksome exercise must be studied by trained and accomplished experts
not clinicians, not school teachers, not moralists, not sanitarians in the
ordinary acceptation of the term, but specialists in humaniculture,
humanists in the true sense, and these great and simple truths, which
the Greeks mastered, must be learned over again in the light of modern
science (not pedantry), and taught to our children's children; then
shall be realized " that future where the highest art and most perfect
science will be those of the development of man's faculties and apti-
tudes to a degree of which the Greek civilization will afford an indica-
tion instead of an unattainable ideal."

vol.lxx. — 21.

338 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

By M. H. POINCARE

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

Chaptee VII. The History of Mathematical Physics
The Past and the Future of Physics
TT7 HAT is the present state of mathematical physics ? What are
» » the problems it is led to set itself ? What is its future ? Is
its orientation about to be modified ?

Ten years hence will the aim and the methods of this science ap-
pear to our immediate successors in the same light as to ourselves;
or, on the contrary, are we about to witness a profound transforma-
tion? Such are the questions we are forced to raise in entering to-day
upon our investigation.

If it is easy to propound them: to answer is difficult. If we felt
tempted to risk a prediction, we should easily resist this temptation,
by thinking of all the stupidities the most eminent savants of a hun-
dred years ago would have uttered, if some one had asked them what
the science of the nineteenth century would be. They would have
thought themselves bold in their predictions, and after the event, how
very timid we should have found them. Do not, therefore, expect of
me any prophecy.

But if, like all prudent physicians, I shun giving a prognosis, yet
I can not dispense with a little diagnostic; well, yes, there are indica-
tions of a serious crisis, as if we might expect an approaching trans-
formation. Still, be not too anxious : we are sure the patient will not
die of it, and we may even hope that this crisis will be salutary, for
the history of the past seems to guarantee us this. This crisis, in fact,
is not the first, and to understand it, it is important to recall those
which have preceded. Pardon then a brief historical sketch.

The Physics of Central Forces

Mathematical physics, as we know, was born of celestial mechan-
ics, which gave birth to it at the end of the eighteenth century, at the
moment when it itself attained its complete development. During its
first years especially the infant strikingly resembled its mother.

The astronomic universe is formed of masses, very great, no doubt,
but separated by intervals so immense that they appear to us only as
material points. These points attract each other inversely as the

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 339

square of the distance, and this attraction is the sole force which influ-
ences their movements. But if our senses were sufficiently keen to
show us all the details of the bodies which the physicist studies, the
spectacle thus disclosed would scarcely differ from the one the astrono-
mer contemplates. There also we should see material points, sepa-
rated from one another by intervals, enormous in comparison with
their dimensions, and describing orbits according to regular laws.
These infinitesimal stars are the atoms. Like the stars proper, they
attract or repel each other, and this attraction or this repulsion fol-
lowing the straight line which joins them, depends only on the dis-
tance. The law according to which this force varies as function of
the distance is perhaps not the law of Newton, but it is an analogous
law ; in place of the exponent — 2, we have probably a different expo-
nent, and it is from this change of exponent that arises all the diver-
sity of physical phenomena, the variety of qualities and of sensations,
all the world, colored and sonorous, which surrounds us; in a word,
all nature.

Such is the primitive conception in all its purity. It only remains
to seek in the different cases what value should be given to this expo-
nent in order to explain all the facts. It is on this model that Laplace,
for example, constructed his beautiful theory of capillarity; he regards
it only as a particular case of attraction, or, as he says, of universal
gravitation, and no one is astonished to find it in the middle of one
of the five volumes of the ' Mecanique celeste.' More recently Briot
believes he penetrated the final secret of optics in demonstrating that
the atoms of ether attract each other in the inverse ratio of the sixth
power of the distance ; and Maxwell, Maxwell himself, does he not say
somewhere that the atoms of gases repel each other in the inverse ratio
of the fifth power of the distance ? We have the exponent — 6, or
— 5, in place of the exponent — 2, but it is always an exponent.

Among the theories of this epoch, one alone is an exception, that
of Fourier; in it are indeed atoms acting at a distance one upon the
other; they mutually transmit heat, but they do not attract, they
never budge. From this point of view, Fourier's theory must have
appeared to the eyes of his contemporaries, to those of Fourier him-
self, as imperfect and provisional.

This conception was not without grandeur; it was seductive, and
many among us have not finally renounced it ; they know that one will
attain the ultimate elements of things only by patiently disentangling
the complicated skein that our senses give us; that it is necessary to
advance step by step, neglecting no intermediary; that our fathers
were wrong in wishing to skip stations; but they believe that when
one shall have arrived at these ultimate elements, there again will be
found the majestic simplicity of celestial mechanics.

34Q POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Neither has this conception been useless; it has rendered us an
inestimable service, since it has contributed to make precise the funda-
mental notion of the physical law.

I will explain myself; how did the ancients understand law? It
was for them an internal harmony, static, so to say, and immutable;
or else it was like a model that nature tried to imitate. For us a law
is something quite different; it is a constant relation between the
phenomenon of to-day and that of to-morrow; in a word, it is a differ-
ential equation.

Behold the ideal form of physical law; well, it is Newton's law
which first clothed it forth. If then one has acclimated this form in
physics, it is precisely by copying as far as possible this law of New-
ton, that is by imitating celestial mechanics. This is, moreover, the
idea I have tried to bring out in chapter VI.

The Physics of the Principles

Nevertheless, a day arrived when the conception of central forces
no longer appeared sufficient, and this is the first of those crises of
which I just now spoke.

What was done then? The attempt to penetrate into the detail of
the structure of the universe, to isolate the pieces of this vast mechan-
ism, to analyze one by one the forces which put them in motion, was
abandoned, and we were content to take as guides certain general prin-
ciples the express object of which is to spare us this minute study.
How so? Suppose we have before us any machine; the initial wheel
work and the final wheel work alone are visible, but the transmission,
the intermediary machinery by which the movement is communicated
from one to the other, are hidden in the interior and escape our view;
we do not know whether the communication is made by gearing or by
belts, by connecting-rods or by other contrivances. Do we say that it
is impossible for us to understand anything about this machine so long
as we are not permitted to take it to pieces? You know well we do
not, and that the principle of the conservation of energy suffices to
determine for us the most interesting point. We easily ascertain that
the final wheel turns ten times less quickly than the initial wheel,
since these two wheels are visible ; we are able thence to conclude that
a couple applied to the one will be balanced by a couple ten times
greater applied to the other. For that there is no need to penetrate
the mechanism of this equilibrium and to know how the forces com-
pensate each other in the interior of the machine; it suffices to be
assured that this compensation can not fail to occur.

Well, in regard to the universe, the principle of the conservation of
energy is able to render us the same service. The universe is also a
machine, much more complicated than all those of industry, of which

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almost all the parts are profoundly hidden from us; but in observing
the motion of those that we can see, we are able, by the aid of this
principle, to draw conclusions which remain true whatever may be the
details of the invisible mechanism which animates them.

The principle of the conservation of energy, or Mayer's principle,
is certainly the most important, but it is not the only one; there are
others from which we can derive the same advantage. These are :

Carnot's principle, or the principle of the degradation of energy.

Newton's principle, or the principle of the equality of action and
reaction.

The principle of relativity, according to which the laws of physical
phenomena must be the same for a stationary observer as for an ob-
server carried along in a uniform motion of translation ; so that we have
not and can not have any means of discerning whether or not we are
carried along in such a motion.

The principle of the conservation of mass, or Lavoisier's principle.

I will add the principle of least action.

The application of these five or six general principles to the differ-
ent physical phenomena is sufficient for our learning of them all that
we could reasonably hope to know of them. The most remarkable
example of this new mathematical physics is, beyond question, Max-
well's electromagnetic theory of light.

We know nothing as to what the ether is, how its molecules are
disposed, whether they attract or repel each other; but we know that
this medium transmits at the same time the optical perturbations and
the electrical perturbations; we know that this transmission must take
place in conformity with the general principles of mechanics, and that
suffices us for the establishment of the equations of the electromagnetic
field.

These principles are results of experiments boldly generalized; but
they seem to derive from their very generality a high degree of cer-
tainty. In fact, the more general they are, the more frequent are the
opportunities to check them, and the verifications multiplying, taking
the most varied, the most unexpected forms, end by no longer leaving
place for doubt.

Utility of the Old Physics. — Such is the second phase of the his-
tory of mathematical physics and we have not yet emerged from it.
Shall we say that the first has been useless? that during fifty years
science went the wrong way, and that there is nothing left but to for-
get so many accumulated efforts that a vicious conception condemned
in advance to failure ? Not the least in the world. Do you think the
second phase could have come into existence without the first? The
hypothesis of central forces contained all the principles; it involved
them as necessary consequences; it involved both the conservation of

342 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

energy and that of masses, and the equality of action and reaction, and
the law of least action, which appeared, it is true, not as experimental
truths, but as theorems; the enunciation of which had at the same
time something more precise and less general than under their pres-
ent form.

It is the mathematical physics of our fathers which has familiarized
us little by little with these various principles; which has habituated
us to recognize them under the different vestments in which they dis-
guise themselves. They have been compared with the data of experi-
ence, it has been seen how it was necessary to modify their enunciation
to adapt them to these data ; thereby they have been extended and con-
solidated. Thus they came to be regarded as experimental truths; the
conception of central forces became then a useless support, or rather
an embarrassment, since it made the principles partake of its hypo-
thetical character.

The frames then have not broken, because they are elastic; but
they have enlarged; our fathers, who established them, did not labor
in vain, and we recognize in the science of to-day the general traits of
the sketch which they traced.

Chapter VIII. The Present Crisis of Mathematical Physics
The New Crisis. — Are we now about to enter upon a third period?
Are we on the eve of a second crisis ? These principles on which we have
built all, are they about to crumble away in their turn? This has
been for some time a pertinent question.

"When I speak thus, you no doubt think of radium, that grand
revolutionist of the present time, and in fact I shall come back to
it presently ; but there is something else. It is not alone the conserva-
tion of energy which is in question; all the other principles are
equally in danger, as we shall see in passing them successively in
review.

Camot's Principle. — Let us commence with the principle of Carnot.
This is the only one which does not present itself as an immediate
consequence of the hypothesis of central forces; more than that, it
seems, if not to directly contradict that hypothesis, at least not to
be reconciled with it without a certain effort. If physical phenomena
were due exclusively to the movements of atoms whose mutual at-
traction depended only on the distance, it seems that all these phe-
nomena should be reversible; if all the initial velocities were reversed,
these atoms, always subjected to the same forces, ought to go over
their trajectories in the contrary sense, just as the earth would de-
scribe in the retrograde sense this same elliptic orbit which it de-
scribes in the direct sense, if the initial conditions of its motion had
been reversed. On this account, if a physical phenomenon is possible,

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the inverse phenomenon should be equally so, and one should be able
to reascend the course of time. Now, it is not so in nature, and this
is precisely what the principle of Carnot teaches us; heat can pass
from the warm body to the cold body; it is impossible afterwards to
make it take the inverse route and to reestablish differences of tem-
perature which have been effaced. Motion can be wholly dissipated
and transformed into heat by friction; the contrary transformation
can never be made except partially.

We have striven to reconcile this apparent contradiction. If the
world tends toward uniformity, this is not because its ultimate parts, at
first unlike, tend to become less and less different; it is because, shifting
at random, they end by blending. For an eye which should distin-
guish all the elements, the variety would remain always as great;
each grain of this dust preserves its originality and does not model
itself on its neighbors; but as the blend becomes more and more inti-
mate, our gross senses perceive only the uniformity. This is why,
for example, temperatures tend to a level, without the possibility
of going backwards.

A drop of wine falls into a glass of water; whatever may be the
law of the internal motion of the liquid, we shall soon see it colored
of a uniform rosy tint, and however much from this moment one
may shake it afterwards, the wine and the water do not seem capable
of again separating. Here we have the type of the irreversible phys-
ical phenomenon: to hide a grain of barley in a heap of wheat, this
is easy; afterwards to find it again and get it out, this is practically
impossible. All this Maxwell and Boltzmann have explained; but the
one who has seen it most clearly, in a book too little read because it
is a little difficult to read, is Gibbs, in his ' Elementary Principles
of Statistical Mechanics.'

For those who take this point of view, Carnot's principle is only an
imperfect principle, a sort of concession to the infirmity of our senses;
it is because our eyes are too gross that we do not distinguish the
elements of the blend; it is because our hands are too gross that we
can not force them to separate; the imaginary demon of Maxwell,
who is able to sort the molecules one by one, could well constrain
the world to return backward. Can it return of itself? That is not
impossible; that is only infinitely improbable. The chances are that
we should wait a long time for the concourse of circumstances which
would permit a retrogradation ; but sooner or later they will occur,
after years whose number it would take millions of figures to write.
These reservations, however, all remained theoretic; they were not
very disquieting, and Carnot's principle retained all its principal value.
But here the scene changes. The biologist, armed with his microscope,
long ago noticed in his preparations irregular movements of little

344 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

particles in suspension; this is the Brownian movement. He first
thought this was a vital phenomenon, but soon he saw that the in-
animate bodies danced with no less ardor than the others; then he
turned the matter over to the physicists. Unhappily, the physicists
remained long uninterested in this question; one concentrates the
light to illuminate the microscopic preparation, thought they; with
light goes heat; thence inequalities of temperature and in the liquid
interior currents which produce the movements referred to.

It occurred to M. Gouy to look more closely, and he saw, or thought
he saw, that this explanation is untenable, that the movements become
brisker as the particles are smaller, but that they are not influenced
by the mode of illumination. If then these movements never cease,
or rather are reborn without cease, without borrowing anything from
an external source of energy, what ought we to believe? To be sure,
we should not on this account renounce our belief in the conservation
of energy, but we see under our eyes now motion transformed into
heat by friction, now inversely heat changed into motion, and that
without loss since the movement lasts forever. This is the contrary
of Carnot's principle. If this be so, to see the world return backward,
we no longer have need of the infinitely keen eye of Maxwell's demon;
our microscope suffices. Bodies too large, those, for example, which
are a tenth of a millimeter, are hit from all sides by moving atoms,
but they do not budge, because these shocks are very numerous and the
law of chance makes them compensate each other; but the smaller
particles receive too few shocks for this compensation to take place
with certainty and are incessantly knocked about. And behold already
one of our principles in peril.

The Principle of Relativity. — Let us pass to the principle of rela-
tivity: this not only is confirmed by daily experience, not only is it
a necessary consequence of the hypothesis of central forces, but it is
irresistibly imposed upon our good sense, and yet it also is assailed.
Consider two electrified bodies; though they seem to us at rest, they
are both carried along by the motion of the earth; an electric charge
in motion, Rowland has taught us, is equivalent to a current; these two
charged bodies are, therefore, equivalent to two parallel currents of
the same sense and these two currents should attract each other. In
measuring this attraction, we shall measure the velocity of the earth;
not its velocity in relation to the sun or the fixed stars, but its ab-
solute velocity.

I well know what will be said: It is not its absolute velocity that
is measured, it is its velocity in relation to the ether. How unsatisfactory
that is ! Is it not evident that from the principle so understood we
could no longer infer anything? It could no longer tell us anything
just because it would no longer fear any contradiction. If we succeed

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in measuring anything, we shall always be free to say that this is
not the absolute velocity, and if it is not the velocity in relation
to the ether, it might always be the velocity in relation to some new
unknown fluid with which we might fill space.

Indeed, experiment has taken upon itself to ruin this interpretation
of the principle of relativity; all attempts to measure the velocity of
the earth in relation to the ether have led to negative results. This
time experimental physics has been more faithful to the principle than
mathematical physics ; the theorists, to put in accord their other general
views, would not have spared it; but experiment has been stubborn
in confirming it. The means have been varied; finally Michelson
pushed precision to its last limits; nothing came of it. It is pre-
cisely to explain this obstinacy that the mathematicians are forced
to-day to employ all their ingenuity.

Their task was not easy, and if Lorentz has got through it, it is
only by accumulating hypotheses.

The most ingenious idea was that of local time. Imagine two
observers who wish to adjust their timepieces by optical signals; they
exchange signals, but as they know that the transmission of light
is not instantaneous, they are careful to cross them. When station B
perceives the signal from station A, its clock should not mark the same
hour as that of station A at the moment of sending the signal, but
this hour augmented by a constant representing the duration of the
transmission. Suppose, for example, that station A sends its signal
when its clock marks the hour 0, and that station B perceives it when
its clock marks the hour t. The clocks are adjusted if the slowness
equal to t represents the duration of the transmission, and to verify
it, station B sends in its turn a signal when its clock marks 0 ; then
station A should perceive it when its clock marks t. The timepieces
are then adjusted.

And in fact they mark the same hour at the same physical instant,
but on the one condition, that the two stations are fixed. Otherwise
the duration of the transmission will not be the same in the two senses,
since the station A, for example, moves forward to meet the optical
perturbation emanating from B, whereas the station B flees before the
perturbation emanating from A. The watches adjusted in that way
will not mark, therefore, the true time; they will mark what may be
called the local time, so that one of them will gain on the other. It
matters little, since we have no means of perceiving it. All the phe-
nomena which happen at A, for example, will be late, but all will be
equally so, and the observer will not perceive it, since his watch is
slow; so, as the principle of relativity would have it, he will have no
means of knowing whether he is at rest or in absolute motion.

Unhappily, that does not suffice, and complementary hypotheses

346 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

are necessary; it is necessary to admit that bodies in motion undergo
a uniform contraction in the sense of the motion. One of the diame-
ters of the earth, for example, is shrunk by one two-hundred-mil-
lionth in consequence of our planet's motion, while the other diameter
retains its normal length. Thus the last little differences are com-
pensated. And then, there is still the hypothesis about forces.
Forces, whatever be their origin, gravity as well as elasticity, would
be reduced in a certain proportion in a world animated by a uniform
translation; or, rather, this would happen for the components perpen-
dicular to the translation; the components parallel would not change.
Eesume, then, our example of two electrified bodies; these bodies repel
each other, but at the same time if all is carried along in a uniform
translation, they are equivalent to two parallel currents of the same
sense which attract each other. This electrodynamic attraction dimin-
ishes, therefore, the electrostatic repulsion, and the total repulsion is
feebler than if the two bodies were at rest. But since to measure this
repulsion we must balance it by another force, and all these other
forces are reduced in the same proportion, we perceive nothing. Thus,
all seems arranged, but are all the doubts dissipated? What would
happen if one could communicate by non-luminous signals whose
velocity of propagation differed from that of light? If, after having
adjusted the watches by the optical procedure, we wished to verify the
adjustment by the aid of these new signals, we should observe dis-
crepancies which would render evident the common translation of the
two stations. And are such signals inconceivable, if we admit with
Laplace that universal gravitation is transmitted a million times more
rapidly than light?

Thus, the principle of relativity has been valiantly defended in
these latter times, but the very energy of the defense proves how serious
was the attack.

Newton's Principle. — Let us speak now of the principle of New-
ton, on the equality of action and reaction. This is intimately bound
up with the preceding, and it seems indeed that the fall of the one
would involve that of the other. Thus we must not be astonished to
find here the same difficulties.

Electrical phenomena, according to the theory of Lorentz, are due
to the displacements of little charged particles, called electrons, im-
mersed in the medium we call ether. The movements of these elec-
trons produce perturbations in the neighboring ether; these perturba-
tions propagate themselves in every direction with the velocity of light,
and in turn other electrons, originally at rest, are made to vibrate
when the perturbation reaches the parts of the ether which touch them.
The electrons, therefore, act on one another, but this action is not
direct, it is accomplished through the ether as intermediary. Under

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these conditions can there be compensation between action and reac-
tion, at least for an observer who should take account only of the move-
ments of matter, that is, of the electrons, and who should be ignorant
of those of the ether that he could not see? Evidently not. Even if
the compensation should be exact, it could not be simultaneous. The
perturbation is propagated with a finite velocity; it, therefore, reaches
the second electron only when the first has long ago entered upon its
rest. This second electron, therefore, will undergo, after a delay, the
action of the first, but will certainly not at that moment react upon
it, since around this first electron nothing any longer budges.

The analysis of the facts permits us to be still more precise. Im-
agine, for example, a Hertzian oscillator, like those used in wireless
telegraphy; it sends out energy in every direction; but we can provide
it with a parabolic mirror, as Hertz did with his smallest oscillators,
so as to send all the energy produced in a single direction. What
happens then according to the theory? The apparatus recoils, as if
it were a cannon and the projected energy a ball ; and that is contrary
to the principle of Newton, since our projectile here has no mass, it is
not matter, it is energy. The case is still the same, moreover, with a
beacon light provided with a reflector, since light is nothing but a
perturbation of the electromagnetic field. This beacon light should
recoil as if the light it sends out were a projectile. What is the force
that should produce this recoil? It is what is called Maxwell-Bar-
tholdi pressure. It is very minute, and it has been difficult to put it in
evidence even with the most sensitive radiometers; but it suffices that
it exists.

If all the energy issuing from our oscillator falls on a receiver, this
will act as if it had received a mechanical shock, which will represent
in a sense the compensation of the oscillator's recoil; the reaction will
be equal to the action, but it will not be simultaneous; the receiver
will move on, but not at the moment when the oscillator recoils. If
the energy propagates itself indefinitely without encountering a re-
ceiver, the compensation will never occur.

Shall we say that the space which separates the oscillator from the
receiver and which the perturbation must pass over in going from the
one to the other is not void, that it is full not only of ether, but of air,
or even in the interplanetary spaces of some fluid subtile but still pon-
derable; that this matter undergoes the shock like the receiver at the
moment when the energy reaches it, and recoils in its turn when the
perturbation quits it? That would save Newton's principle, but that
is not true. If energy in its diffusion remained always attached to
some material substratum, then matter in motion would carry along
light with it, and Fizeau has demonstrated that it does nothing of the
sort, at least for air. Michelson and Morley have since confirmed this.

348 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

It might be supposed also that the movements of matter proper are
exactly compensated by those of the ether; but that would lead us to
the same reflections as before now. The principle so understood will
explain everything, since, whatever might be the visible movements, we
always could imagine hypothetical movements Avhich compensate them.
But if it is able to explain everything, this is because it does not enable
us to foresee anything; it does not enable us to decide between the
different possible hypotheses, since it explains everything beforehand.
It therefore becomes useless.

And then the suppositions that it would be necessary to make on
the movements of the ether are not very satisfactory. If the electric
charges double, it would be natural to imagine that the velocities of
the diverse atoms of ether double also, and for the compensation, it
would be necessary that the mean velocity of the ether quadruple.

This is why I have long thought that these consequences of theory,
contrary to Newton's principle, would end some day by being aban-
doned, and yet the recent experiments on the movements of the elec-
trons issuing from radium seem rather to confirm them.

Lavoisier's Principle. — I arrive at the principle of Lavoisier on the
conservation of mass. Certainly, this is one not to be touched without
unsettling all mechanics. And now certain persons think that it seems
true to us only because in mechanics merely moderate velocities are
considered, but that it would cease to be true for bodies animated by
velocities comparable to that of light. Now these velocities, it is be-
lieved at present, have been realized; the cathode rays or those of
radium may be formed of very minute particles or of electrons which
are displaced with velocities smaller no doubt than that of light, but
which might be its one tenth or one third.

These rays can be deflected, whether by an electric field, or by a
magnetic field, and we are able, by comparing these deflections, to
measure at the same time the velocity of the electrons and their mass
(or rather the relation of their mass to their charge). But when it
was seen that these velocities approached that of light, it was decided
that a correction was necessary. These molecules, being electrified.
can not be displaced without agitating the ether ; to put them in motion
it is necessary to overcome a double inertia, that of the molecule itself
and that of the ether. The total or apparent mass that one measures
is composed, therefore, of two parts: the real or mechanical mass of
the molecule and the electrodynamic mass representing the inertia of
the ether.

The calculations of Abraham and the experiments of Kaufmann
have then shown that the mechanical mass, properly so called, is null,
and that the mass of the electrons, or, at least, of the negative elec-
trons, is of exclusively electrodynamic origin. This is what forces us

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to change the definition of mass; we can not any longer distinguish
mechanical mass and electrodynamic mass, since then the first would
vanish; there is no mass other than electrodynamic inertia. But in
this case the mass can no longer be constant; it augments with the
velocity, and it even depends on the direction, and a body animated
by a notable velocity will not oppose the same inertia to the forces
which tend to deflect it from its route, as to those which tend to accel-
erate or to retard its progress.

There is still a resource; the ultimate elements of bodies are elec-
trons, some charged negatively, the others charged positively. The
negative electrons have no mass, this is understood; but the positive
electrons, from the little we know of them, seem much greater. Per-
haps they have, besides their electrodynamic mass, a true mechanical
mass. The real mass of a body would, then, be the sum of the mechan-
ical masses of its positive electrons, the negative electrons not count-
ing; mass so defined might still be constant.

Alas ! this resource also evades us. Recall what we have said of
the principle of relativity and of the efforts made to save it. And it
is not merely a principle which it is a question of saving, it is the in-
dubitable results of the experiments of Michelson.

Well, as was above seen, Lorentz, to account for these results, was
obliged to suppose that all forces, whatever their origin, were reduced
in the same proportion in a medium animated by a uniform transla-
tion ; this is not sufficient ; it is not enough that this take place for the
real forces, it must also be the same for the forces of inertia; it is
therefore necessary, he says, that the masses of all the particles be influ-
enced by a translation to the same degree as the electromagnetic masses
of the electrons.

So the mechanical masses must vary in accordance with the same
laws as the electrodynamic masses ; they can not, therefore, be constant.

Need I point out that the fall of Lavoisier's principle involves that
of Newton's? This latter signifies that the center of gravity of an
isolated system moves in a straight line; but if there is no longer a
constant mass, there is no longer a center of gravity, we no longer
know even what this is. This is why I said above that the experiments
on the cathode rays appeared to justify the doubts of Lorentz concern-
ing Newton's principle.

From all these results, if they were confirmed, would arise an en-
tirely new mechanics, which would be, above all, characterized by this
fact, that no velocity could surpass that of light,1 any more than any
temperature can fall below absolute zero.

1 Because bodies would oppose an increasing inertia to the causes which
would tend to accelerate their motion; and this inertia would become infinite
when one approached the velocity of light.

350 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

No more for an observer, carried along himself in a translation he
does not suspect, could any apparent velocity surpass that of light ; and
this would be then a contradiction, if we did not recall that this ob-
server would not use the same clocks as a fixed observer, but, indeed,
clocks marking ' local time.'

Here we are then facing a question I content myself with stating.
If there is no longer any mass, what becomes of Newton's law? Mass
has two aspects: it is at the same time a coefficient of inertia and an
attracting mass entering as factor into Newtonian attraction. If the
coefficient of inertia is not constant, can the attracting mass be? That
is the question.

Mayers Principle. — At least, the principle of the conservation of
energy yet remained to us, and this seemed more solid. Shall I recall
to you how it was in its turn thrown into discredit? This event has
made more noise than the preceding, and it is in all the memoirs.
From the first works of Becquerel, and, above all, when the Curies had
discovered radium, it was seen that every radioactive body was an inex-
haustible source of radiation. Its activity seemed to subsist without
alteration throughout the months and the years. This was in itself a
strain on the principles ; these radiations were in fact energy, and from
the same morsel of radium this issued and forever issued. But these
quantities of energy were too slight to be measured; at least that was
the belief and we were not much disquieted.

The scene changed when Curie bethought himself to put radium
in a calorimeter ; it was then seen that the quantity of heat incessantly
created was very notable.

The explanations proposed were numerous; but in such case we
can not say, ' store is no sore.' In so far as no one of them has pre-
vailed over the others, we can not be sure there is a good one among
them. Since some time, however, one of these explanations seems to
be getting the upper hand and we may reasonably hope that we hold
the key to the mystery.

Sir W. Eamsay has striven to show that radium is in process of
transformation, that it contains a store of energy enormous but not
inexhaustible. The transformation of radium then would produce a
million times more heat than all known transformations ; radium would
wear itself out in 1,250 years ; this is quite short, and you see that we
are at least certain to have this point settled some hundreds of years
from now. While waiting, our doubts remain.

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 35*

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM1
II. What Pragmatism Means

By Professor WILLIAM JAMEg

HARVARD UNIVERSITY

SOME years ago, being with a camping party in the mountains, I
returned from a solitary ramble to find every one engaged in a
ferocious metaphysical dispute. The corpus of the dispute was a
squirrel — a live squirrel supposed to be clinging to one side of a tree-
trunk; while over against the tree's opposite side a human being was
imagined to stand. This human witness tries to get sight of the
squirrel by moving rapidly round the tree, but no matter how fast he
goes, the squirrel moves as fast in the opposite direction, and always
keeps the tree between himself and the man, so that never a glimpse of
him is caught. The resultant metaphysical problem now is this : Does
the man go round the squirrel or not? He goes round the tree, sure
enough, and the squirrel is on the tree; but does he go round the
squirrel? In the unlimited leisure of the wilderness, discussion had
been worn threadbare. Every one had taken sides, and was obstinate,
and the numbers on both sides were even. Each side, when I appeared,
therefore, appealed to me to make it a majority. Mindful of the
scholastic adage that whenever you meet a contradiction you must
make a distinction, I immediately sought and found one, as follows:
" Which party is right," I said, " depends on what you practically mean
by ' going round ' the squirrel. If you mean passing from the north
of him to the east, then to the south, then to the west, and then to the
north of him again, obviously the man does go round him, for he
occupies these successive positions. But if, on the contrary, you mean
being first in front of him, then on the right of him, then behind him,
then on his left, and finally in front again, it is quite as obvious that
the man fails to go round him, for by the compensating movements the
squirrel makes, he keeps his belly turned towards the man all the time,
and his back turned away. Make the distinction, and there is no occa-
sion for any further dispute. You are both right and both wrong
according as you conceive the verb ' to go round ' in one way or
another practical fashion."

Although one or two of the hotter disputants called my speech a,

1 The second of a course of eight lectures on ' Pragmatism : A New Name
for an Old Way of Thinking,' given before the Lowell Institute, Boston, and
the Departments of Philosophy and Psychology, Columbia University.

352 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

shuffling evasion, saying they wanted no quibbling or scholastic hair-
splitting, but meant just plain honest English ' round,' the majority
seemed to think that the distinction had assuaged the dispute.

1 tell this trivial anecdote because it is a peculiarly simple example
of what I wish now to speak of as the pragmatic method. The prag-
matic method is primarily a method of settling metaphysical disputes
that otherwise might be interminable. Is the world one or many? —
fated or free? — material or spiritual? — here are notions either of
which may or may not hold good of the world; and disputes over such
notions are unending. The pragmatic method in such cases is to try
to interpret each notion by tracing its respective practical consequences.
What difference would it practically make to any one if this notion
rather than that one were true? If no practical difference whatever
can be traced, then the alternatives mean practically the same thing,
and all dispute is idle. Whenever a dispute is serious, we ought to be
able to show some practical difference that must follow from one side
or the other's being right.

A glance at the history of the idea will show you still better what
pragmatism means. The word is derived from the same Greek term
npaypia, meaning action, from which our words ' practise ' and ' prac-
tical ' come. It was first introduced into philosophy by Mr. Charles
Peirce in 1878. In an article in the Popular Science Monthly
for that year2 Mr. Peirce, after pointing out that our beliefs are really
rules for action, said that, to develop a thought's meaning, we need
only determine what conduct it is fitted to produce; that conduct is
for us its sole significance. And the tangible fact at the root of all
our thought-distinctions, however subtle, is that there is no one of
them so fine as to consist in anything but a possible difference of prac-
tise. To attain perfect clearness in our thoughts of an object, then,
we need only consider what effects of a conceivably practical kind the
object may involve — what sensations we are to expect from it, and
what reactions we must prepare. Our conception of these effects,
whether immediate or remote, is then for us the whole of our concep-
tion of the object, so far as that conception has positive significance
at all.

This is the principle of Peirce, the principle of pragmatism. It lay
entirely unnoticed by any one for twenty years, until I, in an address
before Professor Howison's Philosophical Union at the University of
California, brought it forward again, quoting Peirce, and making a
certain application of it to religion. By that date (1898) the times
seemed ripe for its reception. The word ' pragmatism ' spread, and at
present it fairly spots the pages of the philosophic journals. On all
hands we find the ' pragmatic movement ' spoken of, sometimes with
respect, sometimes with contumely, seldom with clear understanding.

2 January, 1878, * How to Make Our Ideas Clear.'

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 353

It is evident that the term applies itself conveniently to a number of
tendencies that hitherto have lacked a collective name, and that it has
' come to stay.'

To take in the importance of Peirce's principle, one must get
accustomed to applying it to concrete cases. I found a few years ago
that Ostwald, the illustrious Leipzig chemist, had been making perfectly
distinct use of the principle of pragmatism in his lectures on the
philosophy of science, though he had not called it by that name.

" All realities influence our practise," he wrote me, " and that in-
fluence is their meaning for us. I am accustomed to put questions to
my classes in this way: In what respects would the world be different
if this alternative or that were true ? If I can find nothing that would
become different, then the alternative has no sense."

That is, the rival views mean practically the same thing, and
meaning, other than practical, there is for us none. Ostwald in a
published lecture gives this example of what he means. Chemists have
long wrangled over the inner constitution of certain bodies called
' tautomerous.' Their properties seemed equally consistent with the
notion that an instable hydrogen atom oscillates inside of them, or that
they are instable mixtures of two bodies. Controversy raged ; but never
was decided. " It would never have begun," says Ostwald, " if the
combatants had asked themselves what particular experimental fact
could have been made different by one or the other view being correct.
For it would then have appeared that no difference of fact could
possibly ensue; and the quarrel was as unreal as if, theorizing in old
times about the raising of dough by yeast, one party should have in-
voked a ' brownie,' while another insisted on a ' fairy ' as the true cause
of the phenomenon."3

It is astonishing to see how many philosophical disputes collapse
into insignificance the moment you subject them to this simple test of
tracing a concrete consequence. There can be no difference anywhere
that doesn't make a difference elsewhere — no difference in abstract
truth that doesn't express itself in a difference in concrete fact and in
conduct consequent upon that fact, imposed on somebody, somehow,
somewhere and somewhen. The whole function of philosophy ought
to be to find out what definite difference it will make to you and me,
at definite instants of our life, if this world-formula or that world-
formula be the true one.

8 ' Theorie und Praxis,' Zeitsch. des Oesterreichischen Ingenieur u. Archi-
tecten-Vereines, 1905, Nr. 4 u. 6. I find a still more radical pragmatism than
Ostwald's in an address by Professor W. S. Franklin : " I think that the sick-
liest notion of physics, even if a student gets it, is that it is ' the science of
masses, molecules and the ether.' And I think that the healthiest notion, even
if a student does not wholly get it, is that physics is the science of the ways of
taking hold of bodies and pushing them! " (Soience, January 2, 1903.)

vol. lxx. — 22.

354 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

There is absolutely nothing new in the pragmatic method. Socrates
was an adept at it. Aristotle used it methodically. Locke, Berkeley
and Hume made momentous contributions to truth by its means.
Shadworth Hodgson keeps insisting that realities are only what they
are ' known as.' But these forerunners of pragmatism used it in frag-
ments. They were a prelude only. Only in our time has it generalized
itself, become conscious of a universal mission, pretended to a con-
quering destiny. I believe in that destiny, and I hope I may end by
inspiring you with my belief.

Pragmatism represents a perfectly familiar attitude in philosophy,
the empiricist attitude, but it represents it, as it seems to me, both
in a more radical, and in a less objectionable form than it has ever
yet assumed. A pragmatist turns his back resolutely and once for all
upon a lot of inveterate habits dear to professional philosophers. He
turns away from abstraction and insufficiency, from verbal solutions,
from bad a priori reasons, from fixed principles, closed systems, and
pretended absolutes and origins. He turns towards concreteness and
adequacy, towards facts, towards action, towards power. That means
the empiricist temper regnant, and the rationalist temper sincerely
given up. It means the open air and possibilities of nature, as against
dogma, artificiality and the pretence of finality in truth.

At the same time it does not stand for any special results. It is a
method only. But the general triumph of that method would mean
an enormous change in what I called in my last lecture the ' tempera-
ment ' of philosophy. Teachers of the ultra-rationalistic type would
be frozen out, much as the courtier type is frozen out in republics, as
the ultramontane type of priest is frozen out in protestant lands. Sci-
ence and metaphysics would come much nearer together, would in fact
work absolutely hand in hand.

Metaphysics has usually followed a very primitive kind of quest.
You know how men have always hankered after unlawful magic, and
you know what a great part, in magic, ivords have always played. If
you have his name, or the formula of incantation that binds him, you
can control the spirit, genie, afrite, or whatever the power may be.
Solomon knew the names of all the spirits, and knowing their names, he
held them subject to his will. So the universe has always appeared
to the natural mind as a kind of enigma, of which the key must be
sought in the shape of some illuminating word or some power-bringing
word or name. That word names the universe's Principle, and to
possess it is, after a fashion, to possess the universe itself. ' God,'
' Matter,' ' Reason,' ' the Absolute,' ' Energy,' are so many solving
names. You can rest when you have them. You are at the end of
your metaphysical quest.

But if you follow the pragmatic method, you can not look on any
such word as closing your quest. You must bring out of each word its

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 355

practical cash-value, set it at work within the stream of your experi-
ence. It appears less as a solution, then, than as a program for
more work.

Theories thus become instruments, not answers to enigmas, in which
we can rest. We don't lie back upon them, we move forward by their
aid. Pragmatism unstiffens all our theories, limbers them up and sets
each one at work. Being nothing essentially new, it harmonizes with
many ancient philosophic tendencies. It agrees with nominalism, for
instance, in always appealing to particulars; with utilitarianism in
emphasizing practical aspects; with positivism in its disdain for verbal
solutions, useless questions, and metaphysical abstractions.

All these, you see, are anti-intellectualist tendencies. Against
rationalism as a pretension and a method, pragmatism is fully armed
and militant. But, at the outset, at least, it stands for no par-
ticular results. It has no dogmas, and no doctrines save its method.
As the young Italian pragmatist Papini has well said, it lies in the
midst of our theories, like a corridor in a hotel. Innumerable cham-
bers open out of it. In one you may find a man writing an atheistic
volume; in the next, some one on his knees praying for faith and
strength; in a third a chemist investigating a body's properties. In a
fourth a system of idealistic metaphysics is being excogitated; in a
fifth the impossibility of metaphysics is being shown. But they all own
the corridor, and all must pass through it if they want a practicable
way of getting into or out of their respective rooms.

No particular results then, so far, but only an attitude of orienta-
tion, is what the pragmatic method means. The attitude of looking
away from first things, principles, ' categories,' supposed necessities ;
and of looking towards last things, fruits, consequences, facts.

So much for the pragmatic method ! Meanwhile the word prag-
matism has come to be used in a still wider sense, as meaning also a
certain theory of truth. I ask for your redoubled attention here.
If much remains obscure, I hope to make it clearer in the later lectures.

One of the most successfully cultivated branches of philosophy in
our time is what is called inductive logic, the study of the conditions
under which our sciences have evolved. Writers on this subject have
begun to show a singular unanimity as to what the laws of nature
and elements of fact mean, when formulated by mathematicians,
physicists and chemists. When the first mathematical, logical and
natural uniformities, the first laws, were discovered, men were so
carried away by the clearness, beauty and simplification that resulted,
that they believed themselves to have deciphered authentically the
eternal thoughts of the Almighty. His mind also reverberated in
syllogisms. He also thought in conic sections, squares and roots, and
ratios, and geometrized like Euclid. He made Kepler's laws for the

356 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

planets to follow; he made velocity increase proportionally to the time
in falling bodies ; he made the laws of the sines for light to obey when
refracted; he established the classes, orders, families and genera of
plants and animals, and fixed the distances between them. He thought
the archetypes of all things, and devised their variations; and when we
re-discover any one of these his wondrous institutions, we seize his mind
in its very literal intention.

But as the sciences have developed farther, the notion has gained
ground that most, perhaps all, of our laws are only approximations.
The laws themselves, moreover, have grown so numerous that there is
no counting them; and so many rival formulations are proposed in all
the branches of science that investigators have become accustomed to
the notion that no theory is absolutely a transcript of reality, but
that any one of them may from some point of view be useful. Their
great use is to summarize old facts and to lead to new ones. They
are only a man-made language, a conceptual shorthand, as Pearson
calls them, in which we write our reports of nature; and languages, as
is well known, tolerate much choice of expression and many dialects.

Thus human arbitrariness has driven divine necessity from scien-
tific logic. If I mention the names of Sigwart, Mach, Ostwald, Pear-
son, Milhaud, Poincare, Duhem, Heymans, those of you who are stu-
dents will easily identify the tendency I speak of, and will think of
additional names.

Hiding now on the front of this wave of scientific logic Messrs.
Schiller and Dewey appear with their pragmatistic account of what
truth everywhere signifies. Everywhere, these men say, ' truth ' in
our ideas and beliefs means the same thing that it means in science.
It means, they suggest, nothing but this, that ideas become true just in
so far as they help us to get into satisfactory relation with the other
parts of our experience, to synthesize and summarize facts and other
ideas, and get about among them by conceptual short-cuts instead of
following the interminable labyrinth of particular phenomena as they
succeed one another. Any idea upon which we can ride, so to speak;
any idea that will carry us prosperously from any one part of our
experience to any other part; linking things satisfactorily, working
securely, simplifying, saving labor, is true for just so much, true in so
far forth, true instrumentally. This is the ' instrumental ' view of
truth taught so successfully at Chicago, the view that truth means the
power of our ideas to ' work,' promulgated so brilliantly at Oxford.

Messrs. Dewey, Schiller and their allies, in reaching this general
notion of all truth, have only followed the example of geologists,
biologists and philologists. In the establishment of these other sci-
ences, the successful stroke was always to take some simple process
actually observable in operation — as denudation by weather, say, or

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 357

variation from parental type, or change of dialect by incorporation of
new words and pronunciations — and then to generalize it, to make it
apply to all times, and produce great results by summating its effects
through ages.

The process which Schiller and Dewey particularly singled out for
generalization is the familiar one by which any individual settles into
new opinions. The process here is always the same. The individual
has a stock of old opinions already, but he meets a new experience that
puts them to a strain. Somebody contradicts them; or in a reflective
moment he discovers that they contradict each other; or he hears of
facts with which they are incompatible; or desires arise in him which
they cease to satisfy. The result is an inward trouble to which his
mind till then had been a stranger, and from which he seeks to escape
by modifying his previous mass of opinions. He saves as much of it
as he can, for in this matter of belief we are all extreme conservatives.
So he tries to change first this opinion, and then that (for they resist
change very variously), until at last some new idea comes up which
he can graft upon the ancient stock with a minimum of disturbance of
the latter, some idea that mediates between the stock and the new
experience and runs them into one another most felicitously and ex-
pediently.

This new idea is then adopted as the true one. It preserves
the older stock of truths with a minimum of modification, stretching
them just enough to make them admit the novelty and conceiving
that in ways as familiar as the case leaves possible. An outree ex-
planation, violating all our preconceptions, would never pass for a
true account of a novelty. We should scratch round industriously till
we found something less excentric. The most violent revolutions in an
individual's beliefs leave most of his old order standing. Time and
space, cause and effect, nature and history, and one's own biography
remain untouched. New truth is always a go-between, a smoother-over
of transitions. It marries old opinion to new fact so as ever to show
a minimum of jolt, a maximum of continuity. We hold a theory true
just in proportion to its success in solving this ' problem of maxima
and minima.' But success in solving this problem is eminently a
matter of approximation. We say this theory solves it on the whole
more satisfactorily than that theory ; but that means more satisfactorily
to ourselves, and individuals will emphasize their points of satisfaction
differently. To a certain degree, therefore, everything here is plastic.

The point I now urge you to observe particularly is the part played
by the older truths. Failure to take account of it is the source of many
of the unjust criticisms leveled against pragmatism. The influence of
elder truths is absolutely controlling. Loyalty to them is the first
principle — in most cases it is the only principle. The most usual way
of handling phenomena so novel that they would make for a serious

358 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

rearrangement of our preconceptions is to ignore them altogether, or
to abuse those who bear witness for them.

You doubtless wish examples of this process of truth's growth, and
the onlv trouble is their superabundance. The simplest case of new
truth is jf course the mere numerical addition of new kinds of fact,
or of new facts of old kinds, to our experience — an addition that in-
volves no alteration in the old beliefs. Day follows day, and its con-
tents are simply added. The new contents themselves are not true,
they simply come and are. Truth is what we say about them, and
when we say that they have come, truth is satisfied by the plain additive
formula.

But often the day's contents oblige a rearrangement. If I should
now ntter piercing shrieks and act like a maniac on this platform, it
would make many of you revise your ideas as to the probable worth of
my philosophy. ' Eadium ' came the other day as part of the day's
content, and seemed for a moment to contradict our ideas of the whole
order of nature, that order having come to be identified with what is
called the conservation of energy. The mere sight of radium pay-
ing heat away indefinitely out of its own pocket, seemed to violate that
conservation. What to think? If the radiations from it were nothing
but an escape of unsuspected ' potential ' energy, preexistent inside
the atoms, the principle of conservation would be saved. The dis-
covery of ' helium ' as the radiation's outcome, opened a way to this
belief. So Ramsay's view is generally held to be true, because,
although it extends our old ideas of energy, it causes a minimum of
alteration in their nature.

I need not multiply instances. A new opinion counts as ' true '
just in proportion as it gratifies the individual's desire to assimilate the
novel in his experience to his beliefs-in-stock. It must both lean on
old truth and grasp new fact; and its success (as I said a moment ago),
in doing this, is a matter for the individual's appreciation. When
old truth grows, then, by new truth's addition, it is for subjective
reasons. We are in the process and obey the reasons. That new idea
is truest which performs most felicitously its function of satisfying our
double urgency. It makes itself true, gets itself classed as true, by the
way it works; grafting itself then upon the ancient body of truth,
which grows, thus, much as a tree grows by the activity of a new layer
of cambium.

Now Dewey and Schiller proceed to generalize this observation and
to apply it to the most ancient parts of truth. They also once were
plastic. They also were called true for human reasons. They also
mediated between still earlier truths and what in those days were novel
observations. Purely objective truth, truth in whose establishment
the function of giving human satisfaction in marrying one part of
experience with another played no part whatever, is nowhere to be

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 359

found. The reason why we call things true is the reason why they
are true, for ' to be true ' means only to perform this marriage
function.

The trail of the human serpent is thus over everything. Truth
independent; truth that we find merely; truth no longer malleable to
human need; truth incorrigible, in a word; such truth exists indeed
superabundantly — or is supposed to exist by rationalistic-minded think-
ers. But that means only the dead heart of the living tree, it means
only that truth also has its paleontology, and may grow stiff with years
of veteran service and petrified in men's regard by sheer antiquity.
How plastic even the oldest truths still really are has been vividly
shown in our day by the transformation of logical and mathematical
ideas, a transformation which seems even to be invading physics. The
ancient formulas are reinterpreted as special expressions of much wider
principles, principles that our ancestors never got a glimpse of in their
present formulation.

Mr. Schiller gives to all this view of truth the name of ' Human-
ism,' but, for this doctrine too, the name of pragmatism seems to be in
the ascendant, not only in America but on the European continent, so
I must treat it also in these lectures.4

Such then would be the scope of pragmatism — a method and a
genetic theory of what is meant by truth. And these two things must
be our future topics.

What I have said of the theory of truth will, I am sure, have ap-
peared obscure and unsatisfactory to most of you by reason of its
brevity. You may not follow me wholly in this preliminary lecture;
and if you do, you may not wholly agree with me. But you will, I
know, already regard me at least as serious, and treat my effort with
respectful consideration.

You will probably be surprised to learn, then, that Messrs. Schiller's
and Dewey's theories have suffered a hailstorm of contempt and ridi-
cule. All rationalism has risen against them. In influential quarters
Mr. Schiller, in particular, has been treated like an impudent school-
boy who deserved a spanking. I shouldn't mention this, but for the
fact that it throws so much side-light upon that rationalistic temper to
which I have opposed the temper of pragmatism. Pragmatism is un-
comfortable away from facts. Eationalisni is comfortable only in the
presence of abstractions. This pragmatist talk about truths in the
plural, about their utility and satisfactoriness, about the success with
which they ' work,' etc., suggests to the typical intellectualist mind a
sort of coarse lame makeshift article of truth. Such truths are not real

* Even while I correct the proof I receive Mr. Schiller's new volume,
' Studies in Humanism,' N. Y. The Macmillan Company, pp. 492. The title

shows that Mr. Schiller still clings to his term.

360 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

truth. Such tests are merely subjective. As against this, objective
truth must be something non-utilitarian, haughty, refined, remote,
august, exalted. It must be an absolute correspondence of our thoughts
with an equally absolute reality. It must be what we ought to think,
unconditionally. The ways in which we do think are so much
irrelevance and matter for psychology. Down with psychology, up
with logic, in all this question !

See the exquisite contrast of the types of mind ! The pragmatist
clings to facts and concreteness, observes truth at its work in par-
ticular cases, and generalizes. Truth, for him, becomes a class-name
for definite working values in experience. For the rationalist it re-
mains a pure abstraction, to the bare name of which we must defer.
When the pragmatist undertakes to show in detail just why we must
defer, the rationalist is unable to recognize the concretes from which
his own abstraction is taken. He accuses us of denying truth, whereas
we have only sought to trace exactly why people follow it and always
ought to follow it. Your typical ultra-abstractionist fairly shudders
at concreteness. Other things equal, he positively prefers the pale and
spectral. If the two universes were offered, he would always choose
the skinny outline rather than the rich thicket of reality. It is so much
purer, clearer, nobler.

I hope that as these lectures go on, the concreteness and closeness
to facts of the pragmatism which they advocate may be what approves
itself to you as its most satisfactory peculiarity. It only follows here
the example of the sister sciences, interpreting the unobserved by the
observed. It brings old and new harmoniously together. It converts
the absolutely empty notion of a bare static relation of ' correspond-
ence' (whatever that may mean) between our minds and reality, into
that of a rich and active commerce, that any one may follow in detail
and understand, between particular thoughts of ours, and the great
universe of other experiences in which they play their parts and have
their uses.

But enough of this at present? The justification of what I say
must be postponed. I wish now to add a word in further explanation
of the claim I made at our last meeting, that pragmatism may be a
happy harmonizer of empiricist ways of thinking, with the more reli-
gious demands of human beings.

Men who are strongly of the fact-loving temperament, you may
remember me to have said, are liable to be kept at a distance by the
unsympathetic tone of the philosophy which present-day idealism
offers them. It is too intellectualistic for them. Old-fashioned dual-
istic theism was bad enough, with its notion of God as an exalted
monarch, made up of a lot of unintelligible or preposterous ' attri-
butes'; but, so long as it held strongly by the argument from design,

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 361

it kept some touch with concrete realities. Since, however, Darwinism
has once for all displaced design from the minds of the ' scientific,'
theism has lost that foothold; and some kind of an immanent or
pantheistic deity working in things rather than above them is, if any,
the kind desired by our contemporary imagination. Aspirants to a
philosophic religion turn, as a rule, more hopefully nowadays towards
idealistic pantheism than towards the older dualistic theism, in spite
of the fact that the latter still counts able defenders.

But, as I said in my first lecture, the brand of pantheism offered
is hard for them to assimilate if they are lovers of facts, or empirically
minded. It is the absolutistic brand, spurning the dust and reared
upon pure logic. It keeps no connection whatever with concreteness.
Affirming the Absolute Mind, which is its substitute for God, to be the
rational presupposition of all particulars of fact, whatever they may
be, it remains supremely indifferent to what the particular facts in our
world actually are. Be they what they may, the Absolute will father
them. Like the sick lion in Esop's fable, all footprints lead into his
den, but nulla vestigia retrorsum. You can not redescend into the
world of particulars by the Absolute's aid, or .deduce any necessary
consequences of detail, important for your life, from your idea of his
nature. He gives you, indeed, the assurance that all is well with Him,
and for his eternal way of thinking; but thereupon he leaves you to
be finitely saved by your own temporal devices.

Far be it from me to deny the majesty of this conception, or its
capacity to yield religious comfort to a most respectable class of minds.
But from the human point of view, no one can pretend that it doesn't
suffer from the faults of remoteness and abstractness. It is eminently
a product of what I have ventured to call the rationalistic temper. It
disdains empiricism's needs. It substitutes a pallid outline for the real
world's richness. It is dapper ; it is ' noble ' in the bad sense, in the
sense in which to be noble is to be inapt for humble service. In this
real world of sweat and dirt, it seems to me that when a view of things
is ' noble,' that ought to count as a presumption against its truth, and
as a philosophic disqualification. The prince of darkness may be a
gentleman, as we are told he is, but whatever the God of earth and
Heaven is, He can surely be no gentleman. His menial services are
needed in the dust of our human trials, even.more than his dignity is
needed in the empyrean.

Now pragmatism, devoted though she be to facts, has no such
materialistic bias as ordinary empiricism labors under. Moreover, she
has no objection whatever to the realizing of abstractions, so long as
you get about with their aid among particulars, and they actually
carry you somewhere. Interested in no conclusions but those which
our minds and our experiences work out together, she has no a priori
prejudices against theology. If theological ideas prove to have a

362 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

working value for concrete life, they will be true, for pragmatism, in
the sense of being good for so much. For how much more they are
good, will depend on their relations to the other truths acknowledged.

What I said just now about the Absolute of transcendental idealism
is a case in point. First, I called it majestic and said it yielded reli-
gious comfort to a class of minds, and then I accused it of remoteness
and sterility. But so far as it affords such comfort, it surely is not
sterile; it has that amount of cash value; it performs a concrete
function. As a good pragmatist, I ought myself to call the Absolute
true ' in so far forth,' then ; and I unhesitatingly now do so.

But what does ' true in so far forth,' ' true for so much,' mean in
this case? To answer, we need only apply the pragmatic method.
What do believers in the Absolute mean by saying that their belief
affords them comfort? They mean that since in the Absolute finite
evil is ' overruled ' already, we may, therefore, whenever we wish, treat
the temporal as if it were potentially the eternal, be sure that we can
trust its outcome, and without sin dismiss our fear and drop the worry
of our finite responsibility. In short, they mean that we have a right
ever and anon to take a moral holiday, to let the world wag in its own
way, feeling that its issues are in better hands than ours and are none
of our immediate business.

The universe is a system of which the individual members may
relax their anxieties occasionally, in which the don't-care mood is also
right for men, and moral holidays in order — that, if I mistake not, is
part, at least, of what the Absolute is ' known as,' that is the great dif-
ference in our particular experiences which his being true makes for us,
that is his cash value when he is pragmatically interpreted. Farther
than that the ordinary lay-reader in philosophy who thinks favorably
of absolute idealism does not venture to sharpen his conceptions. He
can use the Absolute for so much, and so much is very precious. He
is pained at hearing you speak incredulously of the Absolute, there-
fore, and disregards your criticisms because they deal with aspects of
the conception that he does not follow.

If the Absolute means this, and means no more than this, who can
possibly deny the truth of it? To deny it would be to insist that men
should never relax, and that holidays are never in order.

I am well aware how odd it must seem to some of you to hear me
say that an idea is ' true ' so long as to believe it is profitable to our
lives. That it is good, for as much as it profits, you will gladly admit.
If what we do by its aid is good, the idea itself is good in so far
forth, for we are the better for possessing it. But is it not a strange
misuse of the word ' truth ' to call ideas also ' true ' for this reason ?

To answer this difficulty fully is impossible at this stage of my
account. You touch here upon the very central point of Messrs.

A DEFENCE OF PRAGMATISM 363

Schiller's, Dewey's and my own doctrine of truth, which I can not
discuss with detail until my sixth lecture.5 Let me now say only this,
that truth is one species of good, and not, as is usually supposed, a
category distinct from good, and coordinate with it. The true is the
name of whatever proves itself to be good in the way of belief, and
good, moreover, for definite practical reasons. Surely you must admit
this, that if there were no value for life in true ideas, or if the knowl-
edge of them were positively disadvantageous and false ideas the only
useful ones, then the current notion that truth is divine and precious,
and its pursuit a duty, would never have grown up or become a dogma.
In a world like that, the duty would be to shun truth, rather. But in
this world, just as certain foods are not only agreeable to our taste,
but good for our teeth, our stomach and our tissues ; so certain ideas
are not only agreeable to think about, or agreeable as supporting other
ideas that we are fond of, but they are also helpful in life's practical
struggles. If there be any life that it is really better we should lead,
and if there be any idea which, if believed in, would help us to lead
that life, then it would be really better for its to believe in that idea —
unless, indeed, belief in it incidentally clashed with other greater vital
benefits.

' What it would be best that we should believe ' ! This sounds very
like a definition of truth. It comes very near to saying ' what we
ought to believe/ and in that definition of truth none of you would
find any oddity. Ought we ever to believe what it is not better for us
to believe? And can we then keep the notion of what is better for us,
and what is true for us, permanently apart ?

Pragmatism says no, and I fully agree with her. Probably you
also agree, so far as the abstract statement goes, but with a suspicion
that if we practically did believe everything that made for good in our
own personal lives, we should be found indulging all kinds of foolish
fancies about this world's affairs, and all kinds of sentimental super-
stitions about a world hereafter. Evidently something does happen,
when you pass from the abstract to the concrete, that complicates the
situation.

I said just now that what it is best that we should believe is true
unless the belief incidentally clashes with some other vital benefit. Now
in real life what vital benefits is any particular belief of ours most liable
to clash with? What indeed except the vital benefits yielded by other
beliefs when these prove incompatible with the first ones? In other
words, the greatest enemy of any one of our truths may be the rest
of our truths. Truths have once for all this desperate instinct of self-
preservation and of desire to extinguish whatever contradicts them.
Grant that the Absolute may be true in giving me a moral holiday.
Nevertheless, as I conceive it (and I proceed to speak, now not as an

0 That sixth lecture will soon appear in the Journal of Philosophy, Psy-
chology and Scientific Methods.

364 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

abstract pragmatist, but merely in my own private person), it clashes
with other truths of mine whose benefits I hate to give up on its account.
It is associated with a kind of logic of which I am the enemy; it en-
tangles me in metaphysical paradoxes that are unacceptable, etc., etc.
But I have enough trouble in life already without the added trouble of
carrying these intellectual inconsistencies, so I give up the Absolute.
Personally, I just take my moral holidays; or else as a professional
philosopher, I try to justify them by some other principle.

If I could restrict my notion of the Absolute to its bare holiday-
giving value, it wouldn't clash with my other truths. But we can not
easily thus restrict our hypotheses. They carry supernumerary
features, and these it is that clash so. My disbelief in the Absolute
means disbelief in those other supernumerary features.

You see by this what I meant when I called pragmatism a mediator
and reconciler and said that she ' unstiffens ' our theories.6 She has
in fact no prejudices whatever, no obstructive dogmas, no rigid canons
of what shall count as proof. She is completely genial. She will
entertain any hypothesis, she will consider any evidence. It follows
that in the religious field she is at a great advantage both over posi-
tivistic empiricism, with its anti-theological bias, and over religious
rationalism with its exclusive interest in the remote, the noble and the
abstract in the way of conception.

In short, she widens the field of search for God. Eationalism sticks
to logic and the empyrean. Empiricism sticks to the external senses.
Pragmatism for her part is willing to take anything, to follow either
logic or the senses, and to count the humblest and most personal ex-
periences. She will count mystical experiences if they have practical
consequences. She will take a God who lives in the very dirt of private
fact — if that should seem a likely place to find him.

Her only test of probable truth is what works best in the way of
leading us, what fits every part of life best and combines with the
collectivity of experience, nothing being omitted. If theological ideas
should do this, if the notion of God, in particular, should prove to do
it, how could pragmatism possibly deny God's existence? She could
see no meaning in treating as ' not true ' a notion that was prag-
matically so successful. You see how democratic she is. Her manners
are as various and flexible, her resources as rich and endless, and her
conclusions as obedient and malleable as those of mother nature.
* I get this word from Papini (Leonardo, Aprile, 1905).

CIVOLOGY— A SUGGESTION 365

CIVOLOGY— A SUGGESTION

By professor lindley m. keasbey

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

SO far civilization — Johnson ' abominated ' the word and suggested
' civility ' instead — has been considered philosophically, described
historically, viewed esthetically and computed statistically. I say ' so
far/ and I may add ' so good,' for by these disciplines the phenomena
in question have been arrayed under their vicarious aspects with illu-
minating, impressive, interesting and significant results. Hence we
have systems, narratives, tales and tables, all of which are well enough
in their respective ways. As a whole, however — if one can consider
them collectively — these systems, narratives, tales and tables lack con-
tinuity. Coordination is required, so, it seems to me, civilization
should be subjected to scientific research. Ours is the age of science,
we affirm; certainly each century has contributed its quota. To the
credit of the nineteenth belongs biology, which has succeeded in co-
ordinating the phenomena of life ; it is the task of the twentieth, I take
it, to coordinate the phenomena of civilization and afford us the science
of, Civology, shall I say?

But why, you ask, is a new science necessary? Civilization is the
work of man and anthropology, the science of man, is already estab-
lished. Beavers build dams, but there's not one science of beavers and
another of their dams, why, then, one science of man and another of his
works? If men established civilizations by instinct, as beavers build
dams, and the same sorts of civilizations from generation to generation,
with only such changes as are effected through selection, there would
be no necessity of a separate science, but such is not the case. Civiliza-
tion is not instinctive and conservative, it is purposive and progressive.
So there is something in the distinction Spencer sought to establish
between organic and super-organic phenomena. Man himself is an
organic phenomenon, his works, however, are super-organic — to be
sure, they proceed, as Spencer said, by insensible steps out of the
organic, even as organic phenomena proceed by insensible steps out of
the inorganic, still for this very reason they are super-organic. Since
such is the case, manifestly man and his works can not be included
within one science ; there must be two sciences, one of man, and another
of his works. It is of no avail — in fact it only mixes matters the
more — to divide anthropology into two parts: physical anthropology,
which purports to deal with man himself, and cultural anthropology.

366 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

which sets out to consider his works. Inasmuch as man is an organic
phenomenon, anthropology, the science of man — like botany, the science
of plants, and zoology, the science of animals — is properly speaking a
branch of biology, the general science of all organic phenomena. Call
this physical anthropology if you prefer — though the adjective seems
to me superfluous — but pause and consider before you speak of cultural
anthropology. The adjective in this case is incongruous; cultural in-
cludes man's works, which are confessedly super-organic. Now there
may be no principles capable of coordinating these super-organic phe-
nomena— if so there can be no such thing as a science of civilization —
but simply because these principles are still unknown, or unknowable,
if you like, is no reason why other known principles should be accepted
to serve their stead. You can not coordinate organic phenomena under
inorganic categories, why should you expect to coordinate super-organic
phenomena under organic categories? But this is precisely what is
proposed by the incongruous combination : cultural anthropology — the
science itself is organic, its subject-matter is super-organic.

Congruity requires that the new science shall be super-organic to
correspond with its subject-matter. But there is such a science, you
say, sociology, which claims to be the science of super-organic phe-
nomena. If ' social ' and ' super-organic ' were synonymous, as
Spencer supposed, the claim would be justified, but they're not, and
no amount of argument or assumption can make them so. To go no
further for the moment, it is evident enough man's works are indi-
vidual and familial as well as social; then too, from another point of
view, some of man's works are economic, others esthetic, and so on, all
of which are included within the broader concept ' civilization,' but not
necessarily within the narrower concept ' society.' Thus though soci-
ology is, logically at least, a science of super-organic phenomena, it is
certainly not the science of super-organic phenomena, since it does not,
and can not be made to coordinate the subject-matter in question. All
organic phenomena are coordinated under the general science of biology,
perhaps some day all super-organic phenomena will be coordinated under
the general science of civology. If so, sociology will constitute one of
the subsidiary sciences of civology, even as morphology constitutes one
of the subsidiary sciences of biology. Till then the so-called science
should be classed among the above-mentioned ' systems.' Even as such
— if I may add a word by way of criticism — it is not a striking suc-
cess— to quote from a recent writer : " In regard to the fundamental
principles of sociology, the confusion is hopeless. The student will
search in vain in the systematic treatises on sociology for any definite
body of established doctrine which he can accept as the ground prin-
ciples of the science. He finds only an unmanageable mass of con-
flicting theories and opinions. Each treatise contains an exposition

CIVOLOGY—A SUGGESTION 367

of what the author is pleased to label the ' Principles of Sociology.' But
the ' Principles ' are not the same in any two treatises ; and by no
process of analysis and synthesis can they be brought into harmony.
They are fundamentally contradictory. It is impossible, I believe, to
discover a single alleged ground-principle of sociology that has com-
manded general assent."1 If so, well may Gabriel Tarde advise his
fellow sociologists : " Instead of discoursing upon the merits of this
infant sociology — which men have had the art to baptize before its
birth — let us succeed, if possible, in bringing it forth."

Setting aside cultural anthropology as inadequate and sociology as
insufficient, I revert to the necessity of a new science. As to its name,
it is premature, perhaps, to baptize this infant also before its birth, but
I may at least be allowed to suggest Civology. I do so for consistency's
sake; life is organic, civilization is super-organic, the organic science
of life is called biology, the super-organic science of civilization should
be called civology. I assume, you see, that civilization and super-
organic are synonymous, and rightly, I think; certainly all civil phe-
nomena are super-organic, the only question is : are all super-organic
phenomena civil? They are essentially so, I should say, and, in any
event, civilization is such a flexible term it may very well, far better, in
fact, than any other, be extended so as to include all the phenomena
in question. But enough of the name, now for the substance of the new
science. Its subject-matter is super-organic; so much is established.
The next step is to formulate fundamental principles capable of
coordinating super-organic phenomena — an exceedingly long step.
Indeed it is, so long, I fear I shall be obliged to jump at conclusions.
Fortunately the path is well paved to this point, and beyond the general
direction of advance is defined. So far science exhibits an orderly
processus of phenomena, with the result that organic phenomena have
been shown to proceed by insensible steps out of the inorganic. I
assume simply that such consistency continues to the end, with the
result that super-organic phenomena proceed by insensible steps out of
the organic. If so, civology stands in the same relation to biology that
biology stands to physics and chemistry. The fundamental principles
of biology are subsequent to and consistent with the fundamental prin-
ciples of its antecedent sciences, physics and chemistry ; accordingly, the
fundamental principles of civology should be subsequent to and con-
sistent with the fundamental principles of its antecedent science,
biology. Before taking the step — or making the leap, if you like — it
will be best, then, to go back a bit, and, passing the line of organic
evolution in review, run over the fundamental principles of biology.

Organic evolution is characterized by countless variations, accord-
ing to which the manifold forms of life can be classified under more

1 F. Spencer Baldwin, ' Sociology,' Popular Science Monthly, LV., p. 817.

368 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

or less definite categories — kingdoms, sub-kingdoms, classes, orders,
families, genera, species and varieties, with many intermediate divi-
sions— and arranged in an ascending series culminating, as we view it,
in man. The extrinsic cause, or perhaps I should say the condition, of
these variations is environment. The intrinsic cause is the physio-
logical principle of variability, or mutability, by which biologists mean
the susceptibility to modification inherent in organic life, 'that plas-
ticity or modifiability of any organism in virtue of which an animal or
a plant may change in form, structure, function, size, color, or other
character, lose some character or acquire another, and thus deviate from
its parent form.' This tendency of all organisms to become unlike
their parents is, as I say, in first instance an intrinsic quality, and,
like other natural attributes, transmissible from generation to genera-
tion. But though originally instrinsic, variability is only called into
play by extrinsic conditions. As a result, organic variations are the
outcome of an interaction between intrinsic and extrinsic factors,
variability and environment. Looking along the line of organic evolu-
tion, the general tendency appears to be toward the preservation of the
more useful and the extinction of the less useful or useless characters.
This is due, in first instance, to adaptation, and then to the fact that
selection in one form or another has been operative all along the line,
eliminating the unfit or ill-adapted from the struggle for existence and
allowing only the fittest or best adapted to survive. Selection acts ac-
cordingly as the regulative factor of organic evolution — so in last
analysis variations become " the accomplishment of that which vari-
ability permits, environment requires, and selection directs." To be
noted also is the fact that variability, or the tendency to vary under
environmental conditions, is counteracted to a considerable extent by
heredity, or the tendency to breed true, the former being the pro-
gressive, the latter the conservative, principle of organic evolution.

Man himself is an animal, the final product, apparently, of organic
evolution. Classified biologically he belongs to the sub-kingdom : Ver-
tcbrata, class: Mammalia, order: Primates, sub-order: Anthropoidea,
family: Hominidae, which family constitutes one genus and a single
species. In the course of its evolution this single species has, however,
become further differentiated into at least four sub-species, which con-
stitute the great races of man — and these in turn into a great number
of ethnic varieties. Arranged in an ascending series, we rank the
Negro, or Black race, lowest ; next the American, or Eed race ; then the
Mongolic, or Yellow race, and finally the Caucasic, or White race.
Within this last we take the Anglo-Saxons to represent the highest
ethnic type — though this is more or less arbitrary, depending upon the
point of view. But whatever the order of arrangement, there can be
no doubt of this: these several races and numerous varieties of man-

CIVOLOGY—A SUGGESTION 369

kind represent so many organic variations of the human species,
effected through the interaction of variability and environment, and
established by adaptation and selection. Now each of these races and
every variety of the human species has contributed something to the
sum total of civilization. So it seems, in man's case, the line of organic
evolution is succeeded and supplemented by a line of super-organic
development. And as the line of organic evolution is characterized by
countless variations culminating in the several races and numerous
varieties of man, even so is the line of super-organic development char-
acterized by successive states of civilization, established by the several
races and numerous varieties of man. These states of civilization like-
wise can be classified according to their complexity and arranged in an
ascending series, culminating, if you like, in the existing civilization
of the Anglo-Saxons — though this again is a matter of opinion, or
prejudice perhaps. But whatever the order of their arrangement, of
this I am quite convinced: these states of civilization connote in last
analysis so many systems of utilization. My concept of the subject
may seem somewhat restricted, but I assure you it will expand as we
proceed, meanwhile I ask you only to accept the connotation provi-
sionally, as a possible point of departure.

This at least is obvious : in order to live and move and have their
being — to say nothing of meliorating their material condition — human
beings are obliged to utilize the resources at their disposal. The man-
ners in which and the means and methods whereby they do so are
determined by the circumstances — physical, social and historical —
within which they strive. Circumstance constitutes, accordingly, the
extrinsic cause or condition of utilization. The intrinsic cause in this
case is the psychological principle of utility, which is the quality of
satisfying wants — an elusive and very variable quality, to be sure, none
the less appreciable for all that. All men seek to satisfy their wants,
therefore all men may be said to strive after utility. The quality in
question supplies, as it were, the stimulus, the incentive, or better per-
haps, the motive that makes for utilization. So I should say utility
constitutes the progressive principle of super-organic development, even
as variability constitutes the progressive principle of organic evolution.
To acquire such utility and so satisfy their wants, men, as I have said,
must utilize the resources at their disposal, in the manner and by the
means and methods most in accordance with their circumstances. So
it appears super-organic systems of utilization are, like organic varia-
tions, the outcome of an interaction between intrinsic and extrinsic
factors, utility and circumstance in this case. Looking along the line
of super-organic development, the general tendency appears to be
toward the augmentation of utility accompanied by increasing com-
plexity in the process of utilization. This is due to the expansion of

vol. lxx. — 23.

37Q POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

human wants, the satisfaction of one usually causing another to emerge
in the mind, and so on indefinitely. Circumstances conscribe and
restrict such expansion always and everywhere; so, not being able to
satisfy all their wants at once, men are compelled to choose between
the satisfaction of one and the satisfaction of another. Such choice
is effected through evaluation, which comes in last analysis to this: in
every set of circumstances each man asks himself, ' to the satisfaction
of which of my many wants do I attach the most immediate im-
portance ? which, in a word, is most worth while ? ' and having decided,
proceeds to utilize his resources accordingly. The same is true in a
more general way of peoples and races; as a result of a long series of
evaluations, groups as well as individuals establish their standards in
accordance with their physical, social and historical circumstances. So
I should say : evaluation constitutes the regulative factor of snper-
organic development. If so, utilization becomes in last analysis the
accomplishment of that which utility suggests, circumstances allow and
evaluation controls. A word in conclusion: because of the expansion
of human wants, utility constitutes the progressive principle of super-
organic development, but utility is counteracted to a considerable ex-
tent by imitation, the disposition to accept traditionally established
standards and utilize in accordance with custom and convention instead
of circumstance — imitation constitutes accordingly the conservative
principle of super-organic development.

Before stepping over from the formulated organic into the unfor-
mulated super-organic, in order to indicate the direction and measure
the distance I said: the fundamental principles of civology should be
subsequent to and consistent with the fundamental principles of its
antecedent science, biology. Having taken the step — or made the leap,
if you like — let us look about us and see where we have landed. In
the first place, are the super-organic principles suggested consistent
with the organic principles already established? They seem to me so
■ — I appeal to comparison. Biology has succeeded in coordinating the
phenomena of life; the task I set civology was to coordinate the phe-
nomena of civilization. The phenomena of life are organic, the phe-
nomena of civilization are super-organic. The former, that is the
phenomena of life, present themselves to science as variations; the
latter, that is the phenomena of civilization, should, I say, present
themselves to science as systems of utilization. Organic variations are
conceived of by biology as the accomplishment of that which variability
permits, environment requires, and selection directs; so, it seems to
me, super-organic systems of utilization should be conceived of by
civology as the accomplishment of that which utility suggests, circum-
stance allows and evaluation controls. The parallelism between the
two processes is apparent : Both proceed from intrinsic principles which

CIV0L0G1—A SUGGESTION 371

are progressive in character — the organic process from the principle of
variability, the super-organic process from the principle of utility. In
each case the progressive action of these intrinsic principles is con-
scribed and restricted by extrinsic conditions — variability by environ-
mental conditions, utility by circumstantial conditions. In each case
also the interaction of intrinsic principles and extrinsic conditions is
directed and controlled by factors which are neither intrinsic'' nor
extrinsic, but rather intermediate in character — the interaction of
variability and environment by selection, the interaction of utility and
circumstance by evaluation. Finally, both processes are arrested and
established to some extent by the influence of other intrinsic principles
that are conservative in character, the organic process by heredity, the
super-organic process by imitation. But enough of this, a parallelism
pushed too far comes dangerously near an analogy. In another paper
I shall endeavor to show in what sense the suggested principles of
super-organic development are subsequent to the known principles of
organic evolution.

37^

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE RECLAMATION OF THE NORTH PLATTE VALLEY

BY W. S. COULTER,
ASSISTANT ENGINEER, U. S. K. S.

n "^HE North Platte River rises in the semi-arid region of the North
-*- Park Mountains in Colorado and flows into Wyoming, its course
through the latter state describing a rough quadrant of about one hun-
dred and fifty miles radius, having for its center the southeast corner
of the state. Eighty miles from the state line it turns to the south-
east and so continues to its junction with the South Platte in central
Nebraska. The route through the last two states lies almost wholly

Pathfinder Canyon on the Nokth Pi.atte River. Location ok Dam Site.

within the arid region and drains, in Wyoming, a mountainous country
where the snow lingers long into the early summer. During the winter
and spring the snowfall upon the peaks is considerable, and when the
white mantle begins to dissolve under the increasing heat of the sum-
mer sun, the rivers are gorged with the flood waters. The North
Platte, which trickles along the center of a broad gravel bed throughout
the summer, a pigmy sporting the habiliments of a giant, assumes
monstrous proportions at this season, swelling from a few hundred

THE NORTH PLATTE VALLEY

37 3

second-feet in August to as much as twenty thousand in May, and the
uncouth pile bridges that, stretched meaninglessly for hundreds of feet
over a stream confined within the limits of a single bent, find their
shore abutments awash with the mighty swirl.

Were there no mountains to gather and release the frozen supply,
the North Platte might always remain a comparatively small stream
of equalized flow, as the precipitation is slight on these brown, arid
plains, and the soil absorbs moisture with avidity. Because of this
lack of moisture, the soil, though rich in plant constituents, is not
susceptible to cultivation, excepting where its position relative to the
river margin is such that irrigation may be practised. Many thousands
of acres of land, favorably situated, lie along the banks of the North

Interior ok Pathfinder Diversion Tunnel.

Platte, especially in the extreme easterly part of Wyoming and in
Nebraska, and the settlers have utilized the river waters individually
and through cooperative associations for the past two decades.

The strength of a heavy chain, when measured by the resistance of
its weakest link, may be very small. The total annual flow of the
North Platte is large, but the maximum discharge occurs in the spring
and early summer at, or slightly before, the beginning of the irrigating
season. Throughout the period of irrigation the flow diminishes until,
in the sweltering days of August, the torrent of May is reduced to the
dimensions of a respectable creek. The amount of land that may be
successfully irrigated by waters diverted directly from the river must

374

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fifty-foot Cut on the Interstate Canal.

be measured by this minimum flow during the irrigating season, and
unless some method be found whereby the floods of spring may be
utilized during the summer months, only a limited area of the fertile
lands along the river can be reclaimed.

The solution of the problem obviously lies in the construction of a
storage reservoir having a capacity sufficient to retain the flood waters
of spring, releasing them during the summer months as needed. The
construction of such a storage reservoir and dam, with the auxiliary
diversion dams, headworks and canals, and the adjustment of rights of
way, water rights and other perplexing legal matters, is a task requiring
large sums of money and efficient organization — sums so vast and
organization so perfect that no combination of settlers in a new,
sparsely settled country could hope to achieve it. Private capital may
be advanced by outside parties if a private monopoly of the water-
supply be granted, but in such a case the water users must be always
resisting the encroachments that follow the private ownership of nat-
ural monopolies. The capital may be advanced by outside parties and
the works constructed under their supervision, not for the purpose of
obtaining a private monopoly, but to turn the whole over to an organ-
ization of the water users when they shall have refunded the cost of
installation plus a reasonable return at current rates of interest. There
is but one party powerful enough and philanthropic enough to do this,
and, if the arid regions are to be equitably reclaimed without the crea-
tion of powerful private monopolies, it is to the national government

THE NORTH PLATTE VALLEY

375

that we must look for assistance. The disinterested position and finan-
cial sufficiency of the government and the power it possesses to coor-
dinate those portions of projects lying in different states render it
peculiarly competent to undertake this work.

As a result of thorough preliminary investigations, a reservoir site
for the storage of the waters of the North Platte was located near the
mouth of the Sweetwater River in central Wyoming. The site is a
natural basin, the enclosure having but one outlet, through which the
river escapes by a granite gorge extending for a quarter of a mile
through the hills. This canyon is approximately two hundred feet
deep and one hundred feet wide, and presents an ideal site for a dam
by which to convert the basin above into an immense storage reservoir,
while the surrounding hills of fine-grained granite contain the ma-
terials for construction. The one unfavorable feature is the location
of the dam site with reference to the railroads, the nearest point being
forty-five miles distant. The thousands of barrels of cement and the
contractor's heavy plant must be transported over this long stretch of
earth road, materially increasing the cost of construction. Yet the
natural fitness of the site is such that the cost of the dam and appur-
tenances relative to the body of water impounded is but one dollar per
acre-foot stored.

The dam to be constructed at this point will be of the arch type,
ninety-four feet thick at the base, two hundred and ten feet high and
about two hundred and thirty feet long at the crest. The preliminary

View near Bridgeport, Nebraska, showing Topical Area of Land it is

proposed to Irrigate.

376 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

estimate of stone masonry is fifty-three thousand cubic yards and of
concrete one thousand cubic yards, together calling for forty thousand
barrels of cement. The contract for the dam, exclusive of a cut-off
and dike, was awarded September 1, 1905, for $482,000, the govern-
ment to furnish the cement at the nearest railroad point. During the
summer a tunnel was constructed through the canyon walls, the upper
portal located above and the lower portal below the dam site, for the
purpose of diverting the waters of the river during the construction
of the dam and to be used later for the passage of stored water.

The annual run-off from the Pathfinder watershed is about 1,500,-
000 acre-feet, and the capacity of the proposed reservoir is 1,025,000
acre-feet, being sufficient to retain about two thirds of the entire dis-
charge of the North Platte at this point for one year. A conservative
estimate of the area it is possible to irrigate under favorable circum-
stances, with the amount of water to be stored in the Pathfinder Reser-
voir, lies between 300,000 and 400,000 acres. During the irrigating
season it is proposed to allow the surplus water stored in the reservoir
to escape into the river bed as needed, augmenting the normal flow, to
be intercepted by diversion dams and turned into the headworks of the
canals that are to conduct it to the lands it is intended to irrigate.

The irrigable lands lying below the reservoir have been surveyed,
and wherever it seemed that any considerable area could be reclaimed
for a reasonable expenditure, a preliminary location of canals and
study of the necessary structures involved were made and the probable
cost estimated. Some of the schemes were rejected because of excessive
cost and others are in abeyance, but the Interstate Canal has been pro-
nounced practicable by a consulting board of engineers and is now in
process of construction. This canal heads at a point about eight miles
above old Fort Laramie in Wyoming and follows the northerly side of
the valley for one hundred and fifty miles to a point near Bridgeport,
Nebraska. The land underlying this canal in the extreme eastern part
of Wyoming and in Nebraska is of excellent quality, requiring but the
application of sufficient water to yield bountiful returns. No alkali
demands the construction of expensive underdrains on these lands, and,
with the lands south of the river and those lying higher up the valley
in Wyoming, there is an area sufficient to exhaust even the resources of
the huge Pathfinder Eeservoir. A conservative estimate of the prob-
able area underlying the Interstate Canal, and to receive its service, is
something more than 100,000 acres. The canal is designed to carry
about 1,400 second-feet of water at the headworks. The first forty-
five miles was divided into ten contracts, which were awarded during
the months of June and July, 1905, and construction has been in
progress throughout the summer, with the outlook bright for water in
time for the irrigating season of 1906. In November the second fifty
miles was awarded. There are no tunnels on the Interstate Canal and

THE NORTH PLATTE VALLEY 377

no expensive construction, the alignment following the outlying gravel
knolls along the bluff that borders the valley, occasionally intercepting
these or encountering short stretches of Brule clay. In the quality and
extent of irrigable lands and their favorable juxtaposition to econom-
ical canal alignments, the North Platte project is favored in its dis-
tribution system as well as in storage facilities.

The average rainfall over the irrigated area will probably not exceed
thirteen inches per annum. The mean temperature is 45°, the maxi-
mum 98°, and the minimum — 20° Fahrenheit, and the length of the
growing season is sufficient to mature most of the crops raised in this
latitude, including corn. The principal crop at present grown is
alfalfa, with some corn, oats, wheat, sugar beets and potatoes. The
principal supply market is Omaha, but Denver, Kansas City and St.
Joseph are contributory. The greater part of the produce will be
marketed in the west, unless demand and supply shall be sufficiently
disturbed to unsettle their present balance.

Taking eighty acres as a unit and assuming the total area to be irri-
gated under the North Platte project as 300,000 acres, there will be
3,750 farms. Assuming that the average family consists of five per-
sons, we have 18,750 persons occupying these lands.

Adding to these the merchants, blacksmiths, carpenters, doctors,
clergymen and others, with their families, for whom this population
will provide patronage, the total becomes approximately thirty thou-
sand persons, exclusive of a probable additional population employed
in canning factories. This community will be based upon good homes
on the land, free from tenantry and collectively participating in the
natural opportunity upon which each irrigator depends. The popula-
tion at present inhabiting these lands is small, numbering not more
than a couple of thousand persons.

This work of the Reclamation Service with its promise of partial
relief from the urban congestion that threatens the nation is carried
forward by moneys received from the sale of public lands. These
moneys are restored to the government by the water users and all possi-
bility of initial tenantry is prevented by the stipulation that tracts
exceeding a certain size, between 'forty and one hundred and sixty acres,
must be subdivided and sold to persons who will use them to obtain a
livelihood before water will be placed on the land.

It has been well said that the safeguard of a nation is a large pop-
ulation of working farmers, owning the land they use, and as a means
for the partial accomplishment of this desirable condition, the work of
the Eeclamation Service deserves commendation.

37§

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

SHORTER ARTICLES.

A VOCABULARY TEST

Professor Kirkpatrick's article in
a recent number of the Popular Sci-
ence Monthly leads me to present the
results of an investigation on practi-
cally the same lines, extending over sev-
eral years when I was engaged in teach-
ing college students to read German.
I used a dictionary test, a little dif-
ferent in detail, but practically the
same as Professor Kirkpatrick's, to
find the number of German words
which could be defined by students
when they entered the second year's
work in the subject in college. Some
of them had had one year's college in-
struction, and others were admitted on
examination.

I found that the vocabulary of those
who could pass such an examination
was never less than 2,00D words, and
went from that up to 5,000. The mark
received on the examination was in
close relation to the extent of the vo-
cabulary. Those who had more than
5,000 words were generally fit to go
into a higher course.

The test was repeated at the end of
the year. The result then was from
5,000 to 12,000 words. The marks on
the final examination of the second
year's course were also in close rela-
tion to the extent of the vocabulary.
I tried this with classes for several
years, getting sufficiently uniform re-
sults to prove conclusively to my mind
that these were, the normal figures.

I was then interested to extend the
investigation to English, and had sev-
eral classes make the same experiment
for their own language, but with the
very important feature that I used an
unabridged dictionary, containing over
100,000 words, instead of one contain-
ing only 28,000. I found that most of
the college sophomores reported from

50,000 to 60,000 words. Of course, if
they had had only 28,000 to select
from, it would not be surprising if they
had reported only 20,000; and I think
that Professor Kirkpatrick made a mis-
take in using so small a book. J found
that students who had not studied
Greek regularly reported from 10,000
to 15,000 words less than those who had.
I also experimented with a number
of people who had never been to col-
lege, but, with an ordinary common
school education, were regular readers
of books and periodicals. These re-
ported generally from 25,000 to 35,000
words, though some of them went high-
er, even as high as the lower figures of
the college students.

I then took a few cases of the work-
ing vocabulary in foreign languages of
those really proficient in them, chiefly
among modern language teachers. The
results are probably fairly typified by
my own case, which could, no doubt,
be matched by almost any one who has
made a life study of different lan-
guages. I found that my English vo-
cabulary was about 65,000 words ; Ger-
man (counting all compounds given in
the dictionary), 58,000; Danish (large-
ly the same roots as German ) , 52,000 ;
French, 30,000; Italian, 22,000; Latin,
18,000; Spanish, 16,000; Greek, 13,000,
and Old Norse, 11,000.

I should guess that these figures,
which are for languages belonging to
only two general families, could be re-
duced to 20,000 or 30,000 actual roots,
or perhaps even less ; but to verify such
a guess would require an investigation
with a system of slips, for which I
probably shall never have time. I
leave the interpretation of these facts
to the reader, who can be assured that
they are facts.

E. H. Babbitt. .

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

379

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

A NATIONAL DEPARTMENT OF
PUBLIC HEALTH

The physicians of the country and
the American Medical Association have
long advocated the establishment of a
department of public health as part of
the national government, and they now
have the cooperation of an influential
committee of one hundred, which had
its origin at the Ithaca meeting of the
American Association for the Advance-
ment of Science. Professor Norton, of
Yale University, there read a paper on
the economic advisability of a national
department of health in which he
pointed out the waste due to prevent-
able death and disease. Apart from
the incalculable misery, the saving in
money that could be effected in this
country was placed at from two to
four billion dollars a year. Professor
Fisher, of Yale University, who was
chairman of the section of economic
and social science of the association, is
chairman of the committee of one hun-
dred, which includes many of those
most active in all good works, such as
Presidents Eliot, Hadley, Angell and
Gilman, Drs. Welch, Bryant and Biggs,
the surgeon generals of the army and
navy, Messrs. Felix Adler and Lyman
Abbott, and others of equal influence.
It may not be easy for such a commit-
tee to agree on a definite plan, but
their recommendations should carry
great weight with the president and
the congress.

The first question appears to be as
to whether a national department of
health with a cabinet officer should be
advocated or whether only a bureau
should be recommended for the present.
It is a curious fact that our cabinet
is smaller and less democratic than
that of any other great nation. We
alone have no ministry of education.

Certainly the fusion of the war and
navy departments with one secretary
only and the establishment of three
new departments and cabinet ministers
— one of science, one of education and
one of health — would more nearly rep-
resent what should be the proper func-
tions of government than our present
system. But tms is a question for the
future. A less radical reorganization,
and one wTithin the range of possibility,
should sensible people unite to advo-
cate it, would be the transference of
pensions from the Department of the
Interior to the army and navy, where
they belong, leaving the Department of
the Interior free to become essentially
a department of science, education and
health, whose representative in the
cabinet should be a man such as Presi-
dent Eliot or Dr. Welch. Apart from
pensions and the land office (which lat-
ter might be transferred to the Depart-
ment of Agriculture or of Commerce
and Labor), the Department of the
Interior now consists of the Bureau of
Education and of Indian Affairs, the
Patent Office and the Geological Sur-
vey. If bureaus of science, of pub-
lie health and of fine arts were added,
the Department of the Interior would
become a ' Cultusministerium.' It ap-
pears likely that the most that can be
accomplished by the committee of one
hundred and the American Medical As-
sociation at present would be the estab-
lishment of a Bureau of Health coor-
dinate with the Bureau of Education
under the Department of the Interior.
The function of these two bureaus for
the present would be mainly that of
coordination and the collection and dif-
fusion of information, but they would
be free to develop as rapidly as the
general sentiment of the country per-
mitted.

38o

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

It is not evident that all the work
of the government for science or for
public health should be concentrated
in one department or bureau. Under
existing conditions it is probably bet-
ter that they should be found in each
department. Thus the Agricultural
Department is substantially a Depart-
ment of Agricultural Science, and the
Navy Department should become a De-
partment of Naval Science, the Treas-
ury Department a Department of Eco-
nomic Science, etc. It is a distinct
advantage that work on behalf of
health should now be done under at
least six of the nine departments of
the federal government. What we need
is an increase in amount, range and
scientific productivity of the work done
under each department, and a new
bureau which can coordinate this work
and cooperate in its extension.

THE RESEARCH DEPARTMENTS
OF THE CARNEGIE INSTI-
TUTION

Appended to the report of the presi-
dent of the Carnegie Institution for
1906 are accounts of the scientific work
carried forward under the auspices of
the institution during the year. In
addition to some forty minor grants,
amounting in all to nearly $100,000,
there were eleven departments, for the
support of which over $450,000 was
appropriated.

The largest appropriation last year
was for the department of solar phys-
ics under the direction of Professor
George E. Hale. Further progress has
been made in equipping the observatory
on Mt. Wilson, and a road has been
built to the summit. Research has
been carried forward in various direc-

Mt. Wilson, from Mt. Hamilton, the Seat of the Solar Observatory of the Carnegie

Institution.

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

3§i

tions, including photography of the sun
and of the spectra of sun-spots. Mr.
John D. Hooker, of Los Angeles, has
made a gift of $45,000 for a mirror of
one-hundred-inch aperture for a great
reflecting telescope. The largest new
project planned was also for astronomy
and consists of an appropriation of
$200,000 extending over a decade for a
catalogue giving the precise positions
of the brighter stars. This involves
the establishment of a meridian ob-
servatory in the southern hemisphere.
The execution of the work has been en-
trusted to Professor Lewis Boss, di-
rector of the Dudley Observatory at
Albany.

Next to astronomy, geophysics is
most liberally supported by the institu-
tion. A special laboratory for geo-
physical research is being erected in
Washington at a cost of $150,000. Dr.
A. L. Day, who will have charge of the
department, succeeded last year in pro-
ducing quartz glass, which is of value
owing to its high melting point and
low rate of expansion under tempera-
ture changes. Work in terrestrial
magnetism under Dr. L. A. Bauer, who
has resigned his position in the U. S.
Coast and Geodetic Survey, is sup-

ported by an appropriation of $54,000.
The yacht Galilee made last year two
voyages in the Pacific, traversing some
26,000 miles.

A new department, established last
year, was that of botanical research,
under the direction of Dr. D. T. Mac-
Dougal, whose headquarters are the
Desert Laboratory at Tucson, Ariz.
The flora of the arid regions has been
studied, including the vegetation' of the
Salton Basin, while Dr. MacDougal
has continued his experiments at the
New York Botanical Garden on discon-
tinuous variation in plants. One of
the larger projects is also the work in
horticulture of Mr. Luther Burbank.

Two departments are devoted to biol-
ogy. Work in experimental evolution
is conducted under the direction of
Professor Charles B. Davenport at Cold
Spring Harbor, where land has been
secured and a laboratory erected. The
other is the department of marine biol-
ogy conducted under Dr. A. G. Mayer
at the Dry Tortugas, Florida. A tem-
porary laboratory has been built there.

Work in nutrition has been carried
on by Professor F. G. Benedict, Pro-
fessor R. S. Chittenden and Professor
F. B. Osborne. This is regarded as one

View of the Main Laboratory at the Tortugas Station for Marine Biology of the

Carnegie Institution.

3§:

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

View Across Cold Spring Valley looking Southeastward, showing Part of the
Grounds of the Station for Experimental Evolution of the Carnegie Institution.
Main building at the extreme right, potting house and propagating house in front, and viva-
rium, under construction, in front of and to left of latter. To the left (north) of the main build-
ing is seen part of the east experimental garden. Near the extreme left is the brooder house,
from which radiate eight poultry runs, seen in the middle foreground.

of the major projects, and it is planned
to continue it on a more extensive scale,
funds having been appropriated for the
erection of a laboratory, which will be
placed under the direction of Professor
Benedict. It is stated that the labora-
tory will be built where pathological
cases can be secured for investigation,
and it is now reported that it will be
placed in Boston.

The two remaining departments are
economics and sociology and historical
research. The former, under the direc-
tion of President Carroll D. Wright, of
Clark College, is preparing an eco-
nomic history of the country with the
assistance of more than a hundred col-
laborators. As head of the department
of historical research, Professor J. F.
Jameson has succeeded Professor A. C.
McLaughlin. The department aims to
be a clearing-house for the historical
profession, and is engaged in various
miscellaneous activities, thus differing
somewhat from the other departments.

It will be of great importance for
science to learn whether research work

can be conducted more economically
and efficiently in institutions of this
character than when combined with
educational work, as at our universities,
or with economic work, as under the
government. More than half the in-
come of the institution is appropriated
for work in astronomy and geophysics,
in which subjects the president is es-
pecially competent, but it may be
doubted whether it is an advantage for
institutions in California, Arizona,
Florida, New York, Massachusetts and
South America to be conducted from
Washington. It would probably be
better if the laboratories were built
and endowed, and their future develop-
ment entrusted to local control.

THE SAGE FOUNDATION

Another great foundation on the
lines of those established by Mr. Car-
negie and Mr. Rockefeller is now an-
nounced. Mrs. Russell Sage has offered
to give ten million dollars to a board
to be incorporated by the New York
legislature for a foundation the object

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

;83

of which shall be " the improvement American observatories, under the di-

of social and living conditions in the
United States. The means to that end
will include research, publication, edu-
cation, the establishment and main-
tenance of charitable and beneficial ac-

rection of the Astronomische Gesell-
schaft. Second, to bring together so-
cially astronomers from all parts of
the country, especially the older and
younger men. The latter may think

tivities, agencies and institutions, and the work of the older men out of date,
the aid of any such activities, agencies but they may find the experience of
and institutions already established." the older men and their personal ac-
The original trustees are: Robert W. quaintance with the eminent men of
De Forest, Cleveland H. Dodge, Daniel stm eariier date of great assistance.
C. Gilman, John M. Glenn, Miss Helen The older men have much to learn re-
Gould, Mrs. William B. Rice, Miss gar(jing new methods, and the extensive
Louisa L. Schuyler and Mrs. Sage. appliances at their command may often
This foundation represents a move- be employed to much greater advantage
ment that is likely to become dominant if they keep themselves personally in
in the twentieth century. The future touch witn. the most recent develop-
of the race depends largely upon ments 0f astronomical research. Third,
whether what Dr. Galton has named the presentation of papers. While
'eugenics' can be made a science and hitherto this has been the principal
applied for our welfare. We trust that function of this and other societies it

the income will not be used mainly to
establish or assist charitable institu-

is not necessarily the most valuable.
General discussions are more interest-

tions, but rather for the purposes first ing and instructive than long technical

stated above — research, publication and papers. It may, therefore, be wise to

education. The difficulties are un- I0now the example of some of the engi-

doubtedly very great, and the first step neering societies, and print abstracts of

must probably be to train those com- papers for distribution some days be-

petent to deal with the complex condi- fore the meeting. A brief statement is

tions. But increased interest in the made by the author of each paper, and

scientific aspects of the problems is full the greater portion of the time is de-

of promise for the future. voted to discussion. The ideal condi-
tions for meetings of the society would

THE PROBLEMS OF ASTRONOMY seem to be_a large hotel where all

At the eighth annual meeting of the would eat and sleep under the same

Astronomical and Astrophysical So- roof, and where the meetings could be

ciety of America, held December 27 to held in the same building.

29, 1906, at Columbia University, New On the afternoon of December 28 a

York, Professor E. C. Pickering, di- general discussion took place regarding

rector of the Harvard College Observa- neglected fields of work in astronomy,

tory, on taking the chair, discussed in which a large number of members

three lines of work which he believed took part, and the views expressed were

the society should pursue. According varied and interesting. The president,

to the report of the editor, Professor in opening the discussion, cited a num-

Harold Jacoby, these are : First, by ber of examples of fields ot work, which

cooperation to carry out some great seemed to him important but neglected,

routine investigation too extensive to For example, in the astronomy of posi-

be undertaken by a single observatory, tion the formation of a standard cata-

The best example of this was the ac- logue of stars uniformly distributed,

curate determination of the positions having similar spectra, and of nearly

of the northern stars by European and the same magnitude. Many trouble-

384

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

some sources of error, like those due to
magnitude and color, would thus be
eliminated. The variation in latitude
should be studied at a series of southern
stations like those now in operation in
the northern hemisphere. The sys-
tematic search for double stars of the
ninth magnitude and brighter, under-
taken at the Lick Observatory, should
be extended to the south pole. Pho-
tometric measures of faint stars, of
comparison stars for faint variables, of
the components of clusters, and of
nebulae, are much needed. It is not
known whether the spectra of nine
tenths of the nebula? are gaseous or
continuous. A wide field is opened in
the study of the spectra of bright
variables when faint, and of faint
variables when bright, of the distribu-
tion of faint spectra and of the com-
ponents of clusters.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS

We record with regret the deaths of
the following men of science: Professor
Dimitri Ivanovitch Mendeleef, the emi-
nent chemist, director of the Russian
Bureau of Weights and Measures;
M. Henri Moissan, professor of general
chemistry at the Sorbonne and director
of the Institute of Applied Chemistry;
Sir Michael Foster, professor of physi-
ology in the University of Cambridge,
secretary of the Royal Society from 1881
to 1903, president of the British Asso-
ciation in 1899, and member of parlia-
ment for London University; Professor
Wilhelm von Bezold, director of the
Royal Prussian Meteorological Insti-

1 tute; Professor Nicholas Menschutkin,
professor of chemistry at St. Petersburg;

; Mr. William Wells Newell, of Cam-
bridge, Mass., known for his researches
in folk-lore, especially in connection
with the Arthurian tales, secretary of
the American Folk-lore Society; Pro-
fessor Wilbur Samuel Jackman, who
held the chair of the teaching of nat-
ural science in the School of Education
of the University of Chicago; Dr. David
Irons, professor of philosophy at Bryn
Mawr College; Charles B. Simpson,
entomologist of the Department of
Agriculture of the Transvaal, and for-
merly of the U. S. Department of Agri-
culture, and Dr. John Krom Rees, since
1881 professor of geodesy and astron-
omy and director of the Observatory of
Columbia University.

By special act of Congress Dr. James
Carroll has been made a major in the
medical department of the army, in
recognition of his important work in
yellow fever. — Colonel W. C. Gorgas,
chief sanitary officer of tne Isthmian
Canal Commission, has been appointed
by President Roosevelt a member of the
commission.

M. Daniel Osiris has left by his will
a sum of $5,000,000 to the Pasteur
Institute of Paris. — Rensselaer Poly-
technic Institute has received a gift of
$1,000,000 from Mrs. Russell Sage.
The money will be used for the School
of Mechanical and Electrical Engineer-
ing. Mrs. Sage has also given $1,000,-
000 to the Emma Willard School of
Troy.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

MAY, 1907

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE1

By Professor CHARLES W. BROWN

BROWN UNIVERSITY

TTT ITHIN nine months three regions in the western hemisphere,
* * geologically closely akin but geographically distant one from
the other, have been visited by earthquakes, causing an appalling loss
of life and property. In all cases the disasters have been preceded by
minor earth-shakings for years, and the areas were known to be in
zones of earth-unrest. No warning, however, unless the tremors that
occur at irregular intervals every month or two could be counted as
such, has characterized these last disturbances. But these tremors must
be regarded as the climax of a long-continued yielding to strain which
has resulted in a series of minor breakings. This faulting culminated
in a great fracturing of the earth's crust and a consequent destructive
earth-shaking. The kindred conditions of these different areas appear
to be, first, a considerable amount of differential relief only obtained
where mountains are associated with marine depths ; and, in the second
place, where newer and less compacted sediments occur upon these
slopes.

For several months previous to the afternoon of January 14, 1907,
there had been no noticeable increase in the number or intensity of the
customary slight shocks that occur in the Island of Jamaica every
month or two. In Weather Eeport IV. of Jamaica, Mr. Maxwell Hall

1 The writer desires to acknowledge his indebtedness to Dr. Charles D.
Walcott, formerly director of the U. S. Geological Survey, and to J. D'Aeth,
assistant director of Public \Vorks; Mr. Maxwell Hall, resident magistrate;
Mr. Charlton Thompson, harbor master, and to many other official and private
citizens of Jamaica for their cordial cooperation and aid in the prosecution
of the investigation.

vol. i,xx. — 2r)

386

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE

3§7

Fig. 2. Photograph of Comd'r Barti,ett's Relief Map of the Caribbkan Sea.

has noted some twenty-six minor shocks that occurred from 1880
to 1886, and this number might he regarded as typical of the seismic
phenomena in that region. A slight shock was noticed by many in
November last, hut the memories of the destruction of Port Eoyal by
the historic earthquake of 1692 had been dulled by the interval of two
centuries, and the Jamaicans had begun to think themselves in a region
of comparative safety. Slight tremors and shocks caused but scant
attention or notice on the part of a few of the people. Consequently,
when the real cry of ' wolf ' came, for the first second or so but few
realized the danger. The slight tremor, however, instantly increased
to a terrible vibration of the earth that threw clown great walls and
buildings and inside of a minute transformed the city of Kingston
from a prosperous metropolis to a place of destruction and mourning.

In order to appreciate their relative importance and possible influ-
ence upon seismic activity, let us notice the topographic, geologic and
bathographic conditions that exist at Jamaica.

The etymology of the word Jamaica, originating in two descriptive
Indian words meaning ' well wooded and watered ' and modified by the
Spaniards to ' Xaymaca,'2 is interesting, taken in connection with the
historic topographic description of the island given by Columbus to
Queen Isabella on his return from the West Indies — ' a crumpled hand-
kerchief picked up by the middle.'

The aptness of the simile can not be questioned when one sees the
many steep knife-edged divides (typical 'bad-land' topography) rising
abruptly in fifteen miles 7,400 feet to the misty Blue Mountain peaks
that tower above the small inland valleys or the narrow plains that

2 ' Handbook of Jamaica,' 1906, p. 23.

388

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 3. Tower of Parish Church shattered and inclined to the East. Stopping oi

clock by shock.

fringe the seashore. These plains constitute the very small percentage
of the island that is fairly level, and it is upon these plains that the
larger towns and the larger plantations of bananas and sugar-cane are
found. These level areas are made up of alluvial deposits, fans or
sheet-wash brought from the adjacent ragged slopes by the rivers in
flood time. Upon the rather bare slopes, occasional rectangular patches
of light green show the location of small banana farms or ' pens.' But
the more abundant and typical tropical verdure is found lower down
on the fringing plains. The island has long been known for the abun-

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE 389

dance and variety of its tropical and subtropical products, due to the
fertility of the limestone soil and the abundance of the rainfall, which
varies largely, however, in the amount, from 10 inches at Port Royal
to 126 inches some years in the higher regions.

Geologically, Jamaica is of comparatively recent age,3 for its basal
Blue Mountain series of sediments and intrusives is of late Cretaceous
and Eocene times. This series makes up the mountainous backbone
of the island, while the later Oligocene limestone overlaps the former
series in a thick piedmontal formation covering two thirds of the island.
The more recent alluvial and littoral formations were deposited during
the period of uniform elevation following, and constitute the fringing
plains of the island.

In the structural geology of Jamaica, the earliest axis of folding
now evident is the northwest-southeast line of the Blue Mountains,
with later east-west foldings along the more ancient line of orogenic
movement which outlined the Greater Antilles in early Mesozoic times.4
The writer has observed transverse faults in the Blue Mountain region,
which undoubtedly indicate lines along which fracture may occur.

M. de Ballore5 coincides with Mr. Hill's ideas regarding an east-
west folding for the Antilles in postulating his theory of an anticlinal
axis that marks the line of the Greater Antilles and a parallel synclinal
belt immediately to the north of Jamaica, which coincides with the
Bartlett Deep. In the photograph of a relief map (Fig. 2), the east-
west elevation and depression are brought out strongly.

The bathographic relations of Jamaica are significant. We sec
that Jamaica and the other Antillean islands are but the higher peaks
of a lofty and precipitous, but submerged, mountain chain. The
tremendous differential relief of over 38,000 feet that exists in places
in the Caribbean region apparently coincides with a zone of seismic
and volcanic frequency. We know that the crust of the earth is always
in a state of tension. This stress may come from the shrinkage of the
earth, from the loading or unloading of the earth's surface through
erosion or deposition, or from other sources. The resistance is lessened
on a relatively steep slope (Fig. 1, b) where the points of application
of this lateral pressure at the ends, not falling in the same plane, tend
to produce a fracture. When a sudden slip in the adjustment occurs,
the resulting jar is transmitted through the earth as earthquake waves.

Port Eoyal is at the western tip of a narrow seven-mile sand-spit
that makes a natural breakwater to one of the finest harbors in the

3 ' The Geology and Physical Geography of Jamaica : a study of a type of
Antillean development,' Robert T. Hill, Bull. Mus. Comp. Zool., Vol. XXXIV.,
Geol. Series, Vol. IV., September, 1899, p. 421.

4 Ibid., p. 164.

5 ' Tremblements de Terre,' F. de Montessus de Ballore, 1906, Fig. 63.

39°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

a
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en
SO

o
o

60
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—
a
O

o
o

—

a
oS

•OJ

■a

O 83

m cm

.M C

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60

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OJ OJ

cs
z

o
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THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE

391

West Indies. When the town was for the most part submerged by
the earthquake of 1692, this favorite site was abandoned for the
Liguanea plain just across the harbor, and Kingston was founded on
the largest of the fringing plains of loosely compacted sands and
gravels. And here in this closely built city of 60,000 (and at Buff
Bay opposite on the north shore) the destruction by the last earthquake
was felt most keenly. Eighty-five per cent, of the buildings were in-
jured or destroyed. Then came Kingston's old enemy, fire, and swept
over ten or fifteen blocks of the business and warehouse section. (Figs.
4 and 5.)

The earthquake shock that brought disaster to the island of Jamaica
began, according to the regulator of Mr. J. A. Soulette, at 3 :33 p.m.
Others record its arrival two or three minutes earlier. In various

>*-*..

■'* •■*■!' in

Fig. 5. In Burned District; the Narrow Harbour Street, lookirg ea9t.

places on the island, as reported by local times, its occurrence varied
from 3 :20 to 3 :45 p.m. In the investigation it was found impossible
to plot any coseismal lines, for the reason that no accurate coordinated
time exists in the island. Since the shock, however, there has been a
movement on foot in Kingston to establish a system of accurate time-
keeping throughout Jamaica. The shock lasted about thirty-five
seconds, varying in length with the location and geological position of
the observer. At the east end of the island some noted a duration of
sixty seconds; on the north shore a length of ninety seconds, while at
other points near by the duration reported was anywhere from five to
forty seconds. The slight preliminary tremors were felt immediately
before the main shock, and the noise and roar was heard slightly before
the coming of the major vibrations. One man, used to earthquake

392

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 6. Looking North in General Penitentiary Brick-yard. Upper third of brick
chimney, upper part of smokestack (to guys), and upper ring of lime-kiln ; together with large
part of the brick wall thrown to the east. Fissures made in ground in lower part of view.

countries, hearing the sound from the preliminary tremors, rushed out-
of-doors into the street only to be thrown down toward the west by the
violent shaking. He dragged an injured companion a hundred feet or
so during the slight lessening of the violent shock, and then felt the
second climax of a slow undulating character pass underneath. This
experience is like the phenomena of double earthquake shocks which
have come to Jamaica in past years, and also has characterized many
of the sequent shocks. Another man repeated his actions and found
that he could jump through the fallen wall of the house and then over

r Fig. 7. Looking North to Landing Place at General Penitentiary. Massive walls
cracked ; ;a section of the eastern wall was demolished. Upper part of chimney overthrown
to east.

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE 393

a low fence and get into the street in about forty seconds. The increase
and decrease of the tremors are so gradual that it is very difficult for an
observer to tell just when the shock comes and when it ends. From the
majority of the testimony it is evident that in this disaster the move-
ment quickly reached the major climax in about ten seconds, then less-
ened in intensity for about ten more, then gently swelled to a second
and minor climax and disappeared in a total of about thirty-five seconds.
While there were apparently . no preliminary shocks at Jamaica,
there have been many sequent vibrations of the earth, more or less
severe. The press has chronicled one on February 23, which was the
strongest since the earthquake, and another one also was noted on
March 22. Mr. Maxwell Hall0 has noticed some eighty shocks after
the main shock on January 14 to February 5, several of them shaking
the whole island, while others were of local extent. On the early morn-
ing of January 28 one small shock awakened me instantly by a slight
shaking of my cot in the tent in which we were sheltered. The con-
tinuance of the motion gave one a sense of insecurity and unsteadiness,
and brought with it a slight tinge of dread and nausea. My first im-
pression upon waking was of a rushing, whistling sound from the
southwest; it increased and passed overhead, rapidly lessening and dis-
appearing. It was very similar in sound to the approach and passing
of a large flock of ducks flying low. Then from the race-course, only
a quarter mile distant and only a short time quieted, came the cries of
the frightened negroes and the howls of the numerous dogs with which
Kingston is cursed, and the crowing of the many roosters in the trees
— as they did about every hour during the night. The shock felt on
board the moving Port Antonio train produced a feeling as if the
coaches were running upon the sleepers and at the same time swaying
so much that it seemed as if they would topple over to the southeast.
No damage, however, was done to any of the rolling stock or to the
roadbed. In none of the many tunnels was any displacement ob-
served. A man driving on the road suddenly felt his vehicle thrown
in an angling position across the road and it seemed difficult for the
horse to keep its footing. It was observed, however, that motion some-
times counteracted the vibration of the ground and made the latter
imperceptible.

The sketch map (Fig. 1) shows by the isoseismal lines the relative
intensity of the shock at Kingston as compared with other places on
the island. It has seemed rather strange that the most intense destruc-
tion should happen to occur just where a large number of buildings are
found. But in the case of Kingston, the gravelly foundation in prox-
imity to the epicenter readily accounts for the destruction.

8 Personal communication to the writer.

394

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 8, a. East and West Gable Ends destroyed by Shock.

From the data available, the dependence of earthquakes in intensity
upon topography is well emphasized. Loosely compacted fringing and
alluvial plains extended the intensity farther than the more compact
and elastic mountain regions. Not only do these less elastic plains
give a greater amplitude to the waves and cause greater destruction,
but apparently the earth-waves are affected by plains indented in hills
as sea-waves change their direction in entering the arm of a bay. The
arrows (Fig. 1, a) indicate generally the direction of the wave motion.
In the middle of the Hope Eiver Valley at Mona Plantation an ob-
server noticed the motion pass him and then saw the landslide occur
at the mouth of the river to the southward. As the wave passed over
the cane-fields, a motion was observed similar to that produced in a
field of grain by the wind. The direction here was at right angles to
the path of the wave-motion only five miles away at Kingston, situ-
ated on the western slopes of Long Mountain. The motion approached
the island from the soutlnvest, changing on the land its direction and
intensity with the change in the nature of the material through which
it passed. In the lower part of the city of Kingston the path of the
movement was well marked by the overthrowing of walls, piers, statues,
monuments, large chimneys and a similar movement toward the east of
even large marble slabs covering graves (Figs. 3-9). Northward from
the city the motion appeared to come more from the south, and the
northern walls showed the greatest damage; and westward, the path of
motion appeared to swing so that it came from Kingston. The absence
of any large buildings, away from the villages and cities, made the plot-
ting of directions rather difficult, for the lightly-built mud-wattled huts
were not affected by the shock and tests by hearing are very unreliable.
But there was a general diminution in intensity away from Kingston;

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE

395

Fig. 8, b. East and West Walls crushed.

decreasing rapidly eastward, less rapidly westward and still less so to
the north. Haiti did not feel the shock, neither was it felt at Colon
or at Grand Cayman, 175 miles west, but Santiago, 120 miles north,
experienced a slight shock.

Cracks in buildings, which at Kingston dip some 50 degrees east,
are always perpendicular to the path of the emergence of earthquake
waves. Hitherto, the intensity area and ejDicenter have been regarded
as synonymous. But the dip of the angling cracks at Kingston points
to a locus of disturbance much to the west of that city, while the lines
of isoseismals indicate the intensity area in the eastern half of Kings-
ton. It may readily be imagined, then, that the area of greatest de-
struction may not be directly above the focus. Suppose a highly elastic
rock is there situated, and some distance away is found a plain of
loosely-formed material. The destruction in the latter area will far
exceed that in the former in spite of its favorable location. Until we
register the actual amplitude, wave-length and period and, with the
elasticity of the rock underneath, calculate from the more readily-dis-
cerned data on adjacent but less elastic media the changes that have
occurred in the wave-motion, it will be difficult to determine with
accuracy in a region of rocks of widely varying elasticity the location
of epicenters. For outliers of rock in plains must deflect, refract and
reflect wave-motion and even shadow areas in these plains. The only
conclusion then is that the eastern end of the Liguanea plain was the
nearest area to the real epicenter that by nature of material wTould give
the greatest amplitude to the destructive epifocal waves. Further, the
angle of emergence at Kingston coordinated with the proximity of a
probable epicenter, together with the limited area of disturbance, indi-
cates a shallow origin of about three miles.

396

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig 9. Showing the East Walls of the Jamaica Club. Crushing of the walls by the
roof and of the first story by ceilings and partitions. The majority of the first stories remained
intact.

The line of intensity of the
earthquake destruction apparently
extended to a greater distance
northward than to the east or west.
For at Buff and Annotta Bays on
the north shore, the destruction
was but little less than at Kings-
ton. Furthermore, the shock was
felt at Santiago to the north and
not at Haiti to the east or on land
to the west of Jamaica. The in-
ference is that the locus of the dis-
turbance originated in a line of
north-south faulting rather than
in an area of less linear extent.
The north-south fault-lines extend-
ing throughout the island, as noted
before, and some probable fault-
lines extending in a similar direc-
tion through Cuba (marked by
sharp valleys) may indicate in a
general way the direction of pos-
sible faulting at the present time.
It might be noted that this line
of faulting lies at a consider-
fig. 10. statue of queen victoria, able angle with the general trend

TWISTED AN EIGHTH TURN COUNTER-CLOCK- f ^ Antillean folding. The

WISE FROM THE SOUTH. °

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE

397

beautiful mountain road from Kingston to Newcastle was in the line
of greatest intensity. But though spurs showed considerable destruc-
tion and in places the road slipped off the face of the steep slopes (Fig.
11), or portions of the hills slipped down on the road carrying it
away or obliterating it by landslides in many places, yet the destruc-
tion was caused more by the unstable position of the road, or of these
masses of earth, rather than by the intensity of the shock. At New-
castle, moreover, the buildings for the most part were not damaged to
any great extent, except as their location on a terraced slope or on the
crest of a short divide would place them in a position of unstable
equilibrium. Similar destruction might be caused by a severe rain-

Fig. 11. Destruction of the Beautiful Carriage Road to Newcastle, built on
the steep slopes of the Blue Mountains.

storm, or, in the northern countries, by frost action as well as by earth-
quake waves.

From the investigation of the many cracked walls at Kingston, the
amplitude of the wave motion (as one might expect on alluvial founda-
tions) was considerable. Spaces from half an inch to two inches were
left in massive walls. Floors and ceilings were pulled from the shal-
low supports in many cases and caused destruction in more instances
than would have been necessary had there been greater foresight used
in the manner of building. From an open circular well of masonry
some twenty feet in diameter water was thrown up some eight feet and
over the northeastern lip of this well. A brick pier in a fence was
thrown to the eastward beyond its arc, some two thirds the length of
its radius. At the same place large slabs of marble were moved along

39§

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Frc 12, a Looking East along Belt of Fissuring at Base of the Paltsadoes, showing
one of several parallel fault planes in the sand, with craterlets of mud.

Fig. 12, b. Looking Southeast across Fauitkd Belt.

on their cement base to the eastward some three inches or more in spite
of the attendant friction. The amplitude was probably less than an
inch at Kingston.

The speed of the various waves in this earthquake can only be ap-
proximated. During a slight shock that occurred afterwards, of about
one third the intensity, from an interrupted telephone conversation
from Kingston to Port Antonio, it was estimated that the wave traveled
about two thousand feet per second. As yet no data have been avail-
able concerning the breaking of the cables, and as to the exact time or
speed as marked by such fractures. The Panama cable was broken
in two places, one four miles and the other some twenty miles offshore
from Bull Bay, but so covered was it with debris that a couple of miles

THE JAMAICA EAETHQUAKE

399

Fig. 15. Nearer View of Submergence at Port Royal, looking south. Mostot the area
now covered by water in the photograph was formerly land.

or so of the cable had to be abandoned. The preliminary tremors were
heard before being felt and probably were slower than sound-waves.
With the increase of speed that comes with the augmentation of in-
tensity of earthquakes, it is probable that the rate of the major vibra-
tions was about ten thousand feet per second.

As has been previously stated the shock was a double one; the
first climax apparently came from the west, while the second one, less
disputive and more undulating in its character, apparently came more
from the southward of Kingston. These two directions of vibration
resulted in an almost universal gyratory movement of columns, statues,
piers, sections of brick chimneys, and even of buildings, in a counter-
clockwise (Fig. 10) fashion.

Geologically, earthquakes often are not very important. In the
case of the earthquake at Jamaica, however, there apparently was a

Fig. 10. Twisting of Rails and Tilting of Buildings in Victoria Battery,

Port^Royal, by Subsidence.

400

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

zone of Assuring and subsidence from a hundred yards to three hun-
dred yards in width (Fig. 1, a, AA). It started at the western part

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Si C3

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of the city of Kingston, ran along the water front encircling the harbor,
and continued along the line of the Palisadoes, reaching its greatest
destructive effect at Port Royal. One arm of this Assuring followed up

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE 401

the River Cobre to the carriage road. From soundings taken by the
kindness of Mr. Charlton Thompson, harbor master, it was ascertained
that in several places along the edge of the harbor, the bottom had
sunk from old soundings of a fathom and a half to over six fathoms,
and that on the harbor side of the base of the Palisadoes a series of
step-faults reached a maximum depression at the shore to the north
of four fathoms (Figs. 12 and 13). This zone of disturbance con-
tinued, as far as could be traced, in an interrupted line along the
Palisadoes, and caused a maximum depression at the western tip of
Port Royal, where the buildings were tilted by the sinking and a hun-
dred yards or more of land were submerged to a depth of from eight
to twenty-five feet (Figs. 14-16). This Assuring of the earth was
caused by the repeated tearing apart and closing of the earth's crust,
accompanied generally by the ejection of water, sand and mud, some-
times to the height of three or four feet, but the subsidence prevented
the forming of any cones about these craterlets. The sands first thrown
up were afterwards covered by a layer of mud.

To account for the unique line of Assuring and subsidence is diffi-
cult. It was noted that considerable disturbance took place at the
shore line where the earth vibrations were refracted in changing from
the medium of one elasticity to a medium of a different elasticity.
But the middle portions of the harbor were stable and the channel was
unchanged, though a beacon light near Fort Augusta was broken off.
In this limestone country, solution by underground waters might be
sufficient to account for the sinking of a small area like the harbor ac
Kingston. But the harbor did not sink — only a small encircling zone,
and that located either on the shore or slightly offshore. The con-
tinuous tearing apart and closing of these fissures, covering a few
hours' time as it did in some instances, might account for the
hydraulicking of the loosely compacted sands and gravels in the zone
of Assuring, and allow subsidence. Again, ground-waters may have
caused considerable solution of the limey constituents where the waters
entered the harbor. No theory as yet satisfactorily accounts for this
peculiar subsidence. At the eastern end of the harbor at Rock Fort a
considerable change in underground drainage was observed, where a
small spring was increased to a stream eight feet wide and six inches
deep.

It was here at the Rock Fort penitentiary quarry that a guard gave
me the only reliable account of a sea wave. After a few moments
had elapsed and the convicts had run from the landslides on the face
of the quarry and gathered around him for protection, the sea retreated
for a hundred feet and then advanced inward upon the shore about
sixty feet in a low wave a couple of feet high. Ocho Rios, near

VOL. LXX. — 26

402

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Fig. 13. Looking towards Kingston, across Harbor from Base of Pai.isadoes, show-
ing width of sunken belt. Soundings of four fathoms were taken where the tree-tips emerge
from the water, formerly near the old shore-line.

St. Anne's Bay, on the north shore, also had its harbor emptied for
about seventy-five yards, after which a small incoming wave was fol-
lowed by gradually lessening oscillations. A careful search ten days
later along the other places of the harbor and coast line, however,
revealed no trace of any sea wave, even of slight degree.

Thanks to the energy of the department in charge of the water-
works and to the good fortune that caused no important breaks in the
system, Kingston was shut off from its water supply for only two hours.
Some of its cement reservoirs situated near a large wrecked school
building showed no damage. The pipe that carries the city's sewage
eastward to the sea at the base of the Palisadoes, however, was broken
at several places along the zone of Assuring, and its linear extent, like
that of the water pipe along the Palisadoes, was marked by rifting in

THE JAMAICA EARTHQUAKE 403

the earth. A prompt repairing of the breaks in these two systems
undoubtedly saved the city from an outbreak of destructive pestilence.

Arches in buildings apparently withstood the shock to a notable
degree, whether transverse or parallel to the line of the earthquake
motion. Generally when built in houses they preserved the parts
around them. The Institute, a building in which some two hun-
dred delegates had assembled in the first session of the West Indian
Agricultural Conference, is built on two lines of arches at right angles
to each other. The Institute was damaged, but withstood the shock.
The great destruction of brick buildings in Kingston was doubtless due
to the fact that poor mortar and dry bricks were used in the construc-
tion. The mortar generally appeared to be rather porous and usually
the cracks in the wall followed the mortar, though at Up Park Camp,
where the bricks were laid in cement mortar, the cracks passed through
the bricks.

The streets were narrow (Figs. 4 and 5), so that the falling wall of
even a two-story building would block the street, and many persons
escaped from falling buildings only to be crushed in the choked narrow
streets. A cement floor may help preserve a building from destruction.
In many cases it could be seen that if the floors had been well tied to
the walls and the walls themselves held at the corners, a great lessening
of the destruction would have resulted. On account of the white ants
foreign woods are, unless creosoted, difficult to use, but some frame
houses showed but the slightest effect of the earthquake shock. The
' barrack ' or ' noggin ' structure, much used in earthquake countries,
apparently suffered nearly as much as other brick walls.

Jamaica lies in a region of great differential relief and consequent
stress. The earthquake was confined in its area of greatest destruction
to small limits upon alluvial detrital material, where the amplitude was
increased to bring about this effect, varying with the heterogeneity of
material. The origin of the shock was comparatively shallow and the
earthquake was local in character. While there was a general distinct
rotary motion induced by two components of the vibrations, the major
component came from a westerly direction. There were few evidences
of sea waves, but there was a unique zone of Assuring and subsidence
about the harbor of Kingston. Finally, the disasters at San Francisco,
Valparaiso and Kingston should teach the lesson that in the case of
cities located in a danger zone (where there are many recurring shocks
of slight degree) , there is always a possibility of the coming of a disas-
trous shock ; that certain types of buildings should be built and streets
laid out with that possibility in mind ; that water, sewage and lighting
systems should be planned in sections, and that as far as possible a city
should not be located nor large edifices erected upon uncompacted rocks
and soils.

4°4

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

NOTES ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SEEVICE

By FRED DE LAM)
Pittsburg, Pa.

r N November, 1876, Graham Bell perceived the value and efficiency of
-*- the metallic circuit and advised its adoption for telephone service
to overcome the inductive annoyances. On February 1, 1878, the
parent Bell company recommended the use of metallic circuits for

GROUND

LINE

Fig. 30.

exchange service, although only three telephone companies had ex-
changes in operation that month. But many of the local companies
could only perceive that the introduction of a metallic-circuit system
meant double the cross-arm space, stronger poles, double the terminal

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

4°5

equipment, the rapid displacement of open wires with cable, etc. Then,
in August, 1877, Graham Bell showed the advantage of twisting 'the
direct and return wires around one another, so they should be abso-
lutely equidistant from the disturbing wires ' in order to neutralize
the effect of the inductive current and eliminate the noise.

Many experiments were made to invent an improved transmitter
that would overcome the inductive effect and yet retain the marvelous
simplicity of the hand telephone, with its entailed low cost of main-
tenance. But eventually it was perceived that the displacement of the
magnets in the simple self-contained telephone was possible only

Fig. 31.

through the introduction of a battery current and the employment of
much mechanism that has always carried relatively heavy maintenance
charges.

In the winter of 1878-9, the more progressive companies began
to install the Blake transmitter in combination with the rubber-encased
Bell receiver and the magneto bell. At the close of 1878, 246 Blake
transmitters were in service, and by July 1, 1879, the number had in-
creased to 7,000. On noisy circuits this change afforded a marked
improvement in service that was highly appreciated by local sub-
scribers. Several modifications in the form of these telephone sets
(Fig. 30) were sent out before a standard type was selected. Even
then, as there were several factories licensed to manufacture under
Bell patents, the output of each, while not essentially different, bope"
distinctive trade-marks. In each the battery wires were led into ,the

4o6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

bell box so that the battery circuit might be under the control of and
closed and opened by the telephone hook switch. Interior and sec-
tional views of the Blake transmitter are shown in Fig. 31. With
each of these early Blake instruments a circular was sent stating that it

can be used only as a transmitter, and requires a telephone to hear with. This
is the most complete and perfect set of instruments that can be used for tele-
phonic communication. It will transmit the faintest whisper with perfect
distinctness.

It is a fact that no modern transmitter exceeds the Blake in clearly
and distinctly reproducing the articulation of the subscriber. But
owing to the mechanism employed in its single contact form, it proved
deficient in volume or power required on noisy and on long suburban
lines. Again, its first cost was comparatively low, and the Blake and
similar types of transmitters possess the striking advantage over the
old hand telephone of being placed on a local circuit, thus removing
their varying resistances from the line circuit, to the improvement of
the qualities of transmission. The old hand telephone and the early
box magneto telephone formed a part of the main-line circuit, thus
materially increasing its resistance.

The first Blake instruments were larger in whole and in part than
the transmitter so familiar to all telephone users, while the screw that
controlled the proper adjustment of the electrodes projected through
the box, thus making it possible for the subscriber to adjust the in-
strument for long circuits or short lines, regardless of the mood he
might be in. It only required a little experience to teach the local
companies that the wiser plan was to have trained telephone inspectors
do the necessary adjusting. So the adjusting screw was put insido
the box and the door fastened with lock and key.

There is a wide difference between the underlying principles of
Bell's self-contained transmitter and his variable resistance trans-
mitter, both of which were exhibited at the Centennial. The micro-
phone, or carbon, or battery transmitter, now in use on nearly all tele-
phone lines, belongs to the variable resistance type. Unlike the early
hand transmitter, it does not generate current, but serves as a voice-
governed mechanical regulator of the flow of current chemically gen-
erated in a battery.

After Graham Bell had shown how to solve the problem of speech
transmission, many other inventors were naturally quick to suggest
commercial improvements. A few worked hand-in-hand with Graham
Bell and gladly contributed to his success. Among this number was
Francis Blake, Jr., who invented the transmitter bearing his name
and which was the only transmitter used on a majority of the Bell
lines prior to 1893. Mr. Blake was a Christmas present in 1850;
graduated from the Brookline, Mass., High School in 1866; entered

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

407

the United States Coast Survey, and during the next three years
assisted in the transcontinental longitudinal determinations. Finding
it necessary to make many experiments in determining the velocity
of telegraphic time signals over long circuits, he made a thorough
study of electricity. In 1869 and again in 1872 he was in Europe
and made all the observations in the third and final determination of
the difference of longitude between Greenwich, Paris and Cambridge.
Subsequent observations by European astronomers confirmed his work.
During 1874—6, he was preparing the results of his transatlantic
work for publication, and during this period became acquainted with
Graham Bell. On April 5, 1878, he tendered his resignation, which
was accepted with the greatest reluctance to date April 15. During
the four years that had elapsed since his return from Europe he had
devoted all his leisure to experimental physics. It is recorded that
in carrying on these experiments

he had become an enthusiastic amateur mechanic; so that at the time of his
resignation he found himself in possession of a well-equipped mechanical labora-
tory, and a self-acquired ability to perform a variety of mechanical operations.
Under these conditions what had been a pastime naturally became a serious
pursuit in life; and within barely a month of his resignation, April 5, 1878,
Mr. Blake had begun a series of experiments which brought forth the Blake
transmitter.

Other workers were also

successful in serviceably util-
izing the ' loose contact ' or
microphonic principle in the
telephonic transmitter. In
January, 1877, Emile Berliner
devised his well-known trans-
mitter, for which he filed a
caveat on April 14. It was
referred to in the Washington
Critic, May 18, and on June
4, 1877, he filed an applica-
tion based on his caveat. The
patent was issued January 15,
1878. On April 27, 1877,
Thomas A. Edison filed his application for a patent on a battery trans-
mitter; while in December, 1877, Professor Hughes commenced his
now famous microphonic experiments, which were followed by Hun-
nings's employment of carbon granules. One of the first of the Ber-
liner transmitters is illustrated in Fig. 32

Beferring to some of these experiments with carbon electrodes, Sir
William Thomson (now Lord Kelvin) wrote:

fig. 32.

4o8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

It does seem to me that the physical principle used by Edison in his carbon
telephone, and by Hughes in the microphone, is the same, and that it is the same
as that used by M. Clerac in the variable resistance carbon tubes which he had
given to Mr. Hughes and others for important practical applications as early
as 1866, and that it depends entirely on the fact, long ago pointed out by
du Moncel, that increase of pressure between two conductors in contact pro-
duces diminution of electric resistance between them.

Bell's hand transmitter was not only a telephone complete in itself,
but was a self-contained generator of the alternating-current type.
It was operated by the voice creating sound waves that in turn gen-
erated electric waves through the movements of the diaphragm. These
electrical waves were similar in form to the sound waves and were
transmitted to the receiver and there changed back to sound waves.
When in operation the flow of the current, and every variation in its
strength, was dependent on the varying motions of a diaphragm
moving in a magnetic field; that is, on the speed of an armature of
a miniature dynamo driven by the spoken word. In other words, in
the hand telephone respondent vibratory motion of a soft iron induc-
tion armature in a magnetic field was the essential element in the
successful transmission of speech.

In the Blake and other forms of variable resistance transmitters,
whether single or multi-contact, there is no electro-magnet and no
armature. A battery, usually of the sal-ammoniac type, supplies a
constant current, the flow of which is regulated by increasing or
decreasing the pressure of the diaphragm against the carbon button,
the changes in pressure being governed by the impact of the chan-
ging sound waves on the diaphragm. Thus a carbon transmitter is
not so sensitive, nor does it possess that delicate responsiveness so
noticeable in a magneto transmitter. It matters little what may be
the nature or character of the diaphragm in a variable resistance trans-
mitter, so long as it is sensitive enough to reciprocally respond to the
sound waves produced by the vocal cords. But only a soft iron in-
ductive diaphragm will serve in the magneto type of transmitter.

In the White or solid-back transmitter, now so familiar a part of
Bell equipment, the single-contact feature of the Blake transmitter
is succeeded by a multi-contact arrangement composed of two carbon
electrodes made of the hardest of pure carbon separated by carbon
granules. The selected granules insure a multitude of contacts, and
talking qualities that are unexcelled.

In all these variable-contact transmitters the current is always
knocking at the carbon gateway and seeping through. When the tele-
phone is not in use, the carbon offers just sufficient resistance to pre-
vent the current from forcing the gate wide open. When a person is
talking, the vibrations of the diaphragm decrease the resistance of the
carbon and enable the current to flow through the partially or wholly
opened gateway.

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE 409

Unlike the hand telephone in every respect, the Blake transmitter
consisted of a small black-walnut box, nearly square in form and
having a funnel-shaped hole cut in the door to serve as a mouth-
piece. Within the box was a soft iron diaphragm and suspended par-
allel to its center was a polished button of pure carbon; between the
two hung a German-silver spring bearing a pellet of platinum which
barely touched the center of the carbon. When the Blake transmitter
was in use, the impinging sound waves pressed the diaphragm against
the platinum and forced it with varying pressure against the carbon
button. This changing pressure varied the resistance offered to the
flow of the battery current, which pulsated through the carbon and
into the primary winding of an induction coil or transformer, where
it was converted into an alternating current through the inductive
effects of the secondary winding and passed out in undulating or wave-
like form into the line or subscriber circuit, thence through the
copper wire in the green-covered telephone cord attached to the re-
ceiver, and on into the wire wound on the electro-magnets. Ener-
gizing the latter varied the attractive or pulling power of the pole
pieces, thus causing the receiver diaphragm to vibrate in a manner
exactly reproducing the vibratory motion of the transmitting dia-
phragm and setting up a series of sound waves in the receiver exactly
corresponding to those produced by the vocal cords of the speaker.

So sensitive is a properly adjusted telephone diaphragm that its
vibrations may cause several hundred thousand variations a minute
in pressure of platinum point on carbon button in the Blake trans-
mitter, or between carbon granules in certain other microphonic forms
Xaturally the amount of current thus passing through this carbon
gateway is extremely small, depending principally on the pitch of
the speaker's tone and the physical condition of the line. Under
ordinary circumstances and with both telephones and a complete cop-
per circuit in good condition, distinct transmission of speech only
requires a maximum generation of about one tenth of a milliampere
of current at any one period, or only a millionth part of the current
required to light an incandescent lamp. Again, probably only one
fourth or less of even this infinitely small amount of current reaches
the electro-magnets in the receiver, the other portion being used up
in overcoming resistances. Where the circuit is three or four hundred
miles in length, it is probable ' that only about one one-hundredth
of the original current produced at the transmitting station is finally
utilized at the receiving station.'

Where operating companies desired a less expensive instrument
than the standard Blake set, for use of small users of service, only
willing to pay a low rate, a much cheaper set (Fig. 33) was supplied.
This set was originally intended to be used only on private lines, or

4io

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

for educational purposes; that is, to gradually acquaint the subscriber
with the convenience and value of having a telephone in the home. A
glance at Fig. 33 shows that A is an electric tap-bell, B the hand tele-
phone or receiver, as it is now called, C the Blake transmitter, D ' an
automatic switch on which the telephone must be hung when not in
use,' and E the signalling key.

Installing the regular Blake telephone sets in residences was not
an easy task by reason of there being three separate parts to find loca-
tion for, the magneto bell and receiver, the Blake transmitter, and the
batteries (Fig. 30). So much opposition was encountered in hand-
some homes where the owners objected to the disfigurement of walls,

Fig. 33.

Fig. 31.

that immediate efforts were made to devise more compact forms.
Finally the different parts were all merged into the oblong set or wall
telephone (Fig. 34) so familiar to users of telephone service. An
elaborate Gilliland set, designed for use in the better class of resi-
dences, is shown in Fig. 35. The battery was kept in one drawer,
and pencil, memorandum book, etc., in the other. The Law set used
in New York City in 1879-80 is shown in Fig. 36.

Some years ago it was asserted that all the credit for this service-
able arrangement belonged to a grocer in Denver, who, all unconscious
of the value of the idea to telephone companies, fastened the magneto

DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

411

bell to a partition in his store, attached the Blake transmitter below
the magneto, and screwed an empty soap-box underneath the trans-
mitter. He placed the batteries in the box and made the top of the
box serve as a desk on which to record orders received over the tele-
phone. It is said that the partition suggested to an observant tele-
phone man the back-board of the present telephone set, while the soap
box suggested the usual battery-box. At any rate, about that time
began the movement towards uniformity in equipment, economy in
maintenance and artistic serviceability in installation. ISTo matter how
expert the installer, it was a difficult task to quickly and neatly install
several parts of a telephone set, where each part had to be firmly
attached to the wall, especially in handsome residences. Thus the
more compact forms were welcomed innovations. But they had one

^um^La

Fig. 35.

Fig. 36.

exasperating defect. The Blake transmitter, instead of being placed
flush with the front of the bell box was set in so far as to lead to
much vexation of spirit, through the subscriber's forehead coming in
contact with the bell box.

In referring to the early telephone equipment, Mr. B. E. Sunny
stated, in 1887, that

the field for improvement in the construction of subscribers' apparatus is a par-
ticularly broad one. The entire outfit is crude and defective, and it represents
a smaller growth towards perfection than anything else that we have in the
service. The magneto as constructed to-day (1887) is a cheap looking affair,
except the new Gilliland, and they are all more or less unreliable, while after
ten years' experience we ought to have an instrument that would look in keep-
ing with the furnishings of the finest residence or office, and that would be free
from electrical defects.

412 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

The parent Bell company perceived the wisdom of standardizing
its equipment long before it decided on uniformity in line construc-
tion. With that end in view, as well as ' to obtain a permanent in-
terest in the manufacture of telephones and switchboards/ in 1881, it
purchased the factory and business of Charles Williams, Jr., of Boston,
where Graham Bell had carried on his early experiments, and where
the first several thousand telephones were made. It also bought an
interest in the Western Electric Manufacturing Company of Chicago
and merged the two into one organization, which, under the later
name of Western Electric Company, has grown to be the largest indus-
trial plant of its kind in the world, occupying more than seventy acres
of floor space, employing more than twenty- five thousand persons, and
with sales exceeding $70,000,000 annually.

In connection with the early selection of a permanent manufac-
turer, Mr. T. B. Doolittle, formerly an experienced manufacturer of
metal goods, makes the following statement that indicates how easily
the city of Bridgeport, Connecticut, might possibly have had a manu-
facturing establishment similar to the Western Electric Company :

My interest in mechanics and manufacture led me to spend much time in
the factory of Mr. Charles Williams, Jr., in 1877-78, and to offer suggestions
regarding the details of construction. For example, I substituted the bell ' struck
up ' from sheet metal in place ot the cast and turned bell, thus reducing the cost
from about fifty cents to about five cents. I also brought about a large reduc-
tion in the cost of the cabinet work used in the manufacture of switchboards
and telephone apparatus. These large savings attracted the attention of the
management of the parent company, and I was authorized to find a manufac-
turer having a" factory properly equipped and enter into negotiations for the
manufacture of telephone equipment. I visited several factories in Connecticut,
among others the Wheeler & Wilson Sewing Machine Company, at Bridgeport,
but found none who were willing to enter into such a hazardous undertaking
and one that promised so little future growth. I endeavored to convince Mr.
Wheeler that the future was rich in promise, and that his company would not
only become a licensed manufacturer, but, in all probability the permanent
manufacturer. But though trade was slack, he would not entertain my
proposition.

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 413

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES

By Dr. CHARLES WILLIAM SUPER

ATHENS, O.

YT7 HEN we pass along the streets of our cities and large towns and
* * observe the number of persons between the ages of twenty and
forty who wear spectacles; or again, if we inspect the eyesight of the
children of our public schools and of the young people in our colleges,
we find that a large proportion of the present generation is afflicted
with visual organs more or less defective. More than this, there is
hardly a person over fifty who does not use some sort of artificial
aid to sight. In the German universities the situation is still worse.
There, apparently, almost one half of the students wear eye-glasses.
England furnishes a marked contrast; spectacles on the eyes of young
men and young women are far less common. The chief reason doubt-
less is the fondness of both sexes for outdoor life. It is highly probable
that our somewhat abnormal eyesight is chiefly due to the abnormal
conditions under which we live. The epithet abnormal is of course to
be understood in a relative sense ; it is not strictly applicable to a highly
developed stage of civilization. It can not properly be said that the
conditions under which the Papuans or the Bushmen live are more
natural than those of the residents of London or New York. Each
generation is, in a sense, weaker but also wiser; what is lost in one
direction is more than made up in another. Still, the injudicious
use of the eyes in artificial light and a short range of vision seem to
be inevitably imposed upon the dwellers in cities. It is a well-estab-
lished fact in hygiene that any bodily organ is strengthened by the
wise use of it. This being the case, it follows that persons who spend
much of their time out-of-doors and in looking at objects afar off,
or who use their eyes but little after nightfall, will retain their sight
unimpaired much longer than do most people of the present day. On
the other hand, failing vision is the natural concomitant of advancing
age, so that the number of persons beyond sixty who see clearly with the
naked eye is exceedingly small and probably was never very large.

Moreover, the human eye is said to be a rather ill-contrived piece
of mechanism. A celebrated German physicist is reported to have
remarked that if an artisan were to make for him a piece of apparatus
so poorly adapted to its purpose he would not accept it. Biographers
have, however, preserved the names of a considerable number of persons
from the remote and more recent past whose mental faculties were
unimpaired at fourscore and beyond, though it is not often that this
could be affirmed of their sight. The last chapter of Deuteronomy

414 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

informs us that Moses was ' an hundred 'and twenty years old ; his
eye was not dim nor his natural force abated.' There is nothing in-
credible in this record, for similar instances are not very rare. A
colored woman died in Philadelphia in January, 1906, who seemed to
have pretty clear recollections of Washington at Valley Forge. Her
friends claimed for her the age of one hundred and thirty-five. A
writer in a recent issue of the Monthly Rpview mentions a number of
Kaffirs still living in 1885 who professed to have taken part in a battle
in 1818. Burton made the acquaintance of a chief, whom he described
in 1857 as a very old man; but eighteen years later Cameron found him
still ruling his people and very little changed in appearance. While
Humboldt was in Lima an Indian died there at the age of one hundred
and forty-three. " Blindness overtook him at the age of one hundred
and thirty, but till that misfortune he used to walk three or four
leagues daily." He also declares that during his five years' residence
in Mexico and South America he saw no person afflicted with bodily
disease or even with squinting. Tschudi says that one hundred and
thirty years ' with unimpaired faculties ' is not at all uncommon in
Peru. These references are doubtless to natives; and what is true of
the so-called lower races does not necessarily hold good of the more
advanced peoples. Among the more recent cases that are thoroughly
authenticated are the Hon. David Work, of Fredericton, 1ST. B., who
died in 1905, nearly one hundred and two years old. He was a man
of mark in his community, and mentally and physically sound almost
to the end. The celebrated French chemist, Chevreul, who died in
Paris in 1889, was about a year older. John Wesley at eighty-five
writes that he is " not quite so agile as he was in times past and his
sight is a little decayed." Most persons, unless their observations have
been very limited, have met individuals who lived close upon fivescore
years or even beyond. Several Eoman writers likewise give 120 years
as the utmost limit of human life. Sight is preeminently the civilizing
sense ; upon it all progress depends, or, as Oken expresses it, " Sight
is the light sense. Through it we become acquainted with universal
relations, this being reason. Without the eye there would be no
reason." The same thought is expressed in the Sermon on the Mount :
" The lamp of the body is the eye. If your eye is unclouded your
whole body will be lighted up ; but if your eye be diseased your whole
body will be dark." Not only painting, sculpture and architecture are
dependent upon sight, but language also as soon as it becomes the
transmitter of experience, whether inner or outer, from age to age.
Those peoples that never cultivate speech beyond the point where it is
perceived by the ear alone, never advance farther than the primitive
stage. But as soon as speech becomes cognizable by the sight, it can be
employed to fix the experience and the accumulated knowledge of each
generation. It is by means of our eyesight that we are able to learn the

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 415

thoughts and, to some extent, the feelings of the people of the most
distant ages and the most remote regions, almost as well as those of our
intimate friends. Yet when we remember that man has left intelligible
traces upon the earth, dating back at least seven thousand years, and
compare their testimony with the world, say three hundred years ago,
we are not conscious of a great advance either intellectually or socially.
It is evident, therefore, that important as sight is to man, something
more is needed to make him progressive. As soon as the mind be-
comes fossilized bv tradition all advance ceases. If, on the other hand,
we compare the world about a.d. 1600 with its condition at the present
day, we are constrained to marvel at the advance that has been made.
In fact it is not putting the case too strong to say that if by progress
we mean man's power over matter, it has been greater during the last
fifty years than during all the preceding time of his abode upon the
earth. No more striking example of the stationary condition of man-
kind in certain relations exists than that furnished by artificial lighting.
The situation in 1800 was virtually the same that had existed from the
earliest times. Torches were used out-of-doors and lamps indoors.
Many of the latter found in Grecian and Soman tombs served their
purpose just as well as some of those used within the memory of men
now living. Friction matches did not become general until about
the middle of the last century. It is sometimes said in a tone of
deprecation that as the realm of science increases that of poetry
diminishes. Yet the fact is that the appreciation of the beauties of
natural scenery has advanced with the careful study of nature. There
may not be a realized connection, for poets are rarely scientists; albeit
both have often been equally close observers, even if not found in each
other's company or united in the same person. Few men have written
more appreciatively or more sympathetically of the beauty and
grandeur of natural scenery than geologists not a few; and geology is
among the most modern of the sciences. The botanist who sees vegeta-
tion not only with his corporeal eye, but with his mind as well, derives
a keener enjoyment from the beauties of vegetable life than does he who
can not see beneath the surface; who has no conception of the forces
that make plant life what it is.

To the ancients, especially to the Greeks, sea and stream, forest and
field, mountain and moorland, were peopled with animate beings, it is
true, and their imaginations seem to have sported in a region that is
virtually closed to us moderns. On the other hand, while these be-
ings were objects of interest they were also sources of terror ; they were
quite as often the doers of mischief as the bringers of blessings. Storms
and lightning, floods and volcanic eruptions, are still natural phe-
nomena to be feared, but they are no longer looked upon with super-
stitious dread as something to which man must submit with a blind
and unreasoning fatalism. Their devastations can in some measure

416 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

be guarded against and mitigated. Such lines as the following from
Bryant could not have been written by a Greek poet since they express
sentiments to which entire antiquity was a stranger:

Look on this beautiful world and read the truth

On her fair page; see, every season brings

New change to her, of everlasting youth;

Still the green soil with living joyous things

Swarms; the wide air is full of joyous wings,

And myriads still are happy in the sleep

Of oean's azure gulfs, and where he flings

The restless surge, eternal love doth keep,

In his complacent arms, the earth, the air, the deep.

The same affirmation may be made of Bryant's ' To a Cloud/ ' To
a Waterfowl/ and other of his poems not a few ; or of Shelley's ' Cloud '
or the ' Skylark/ and many more. In Plato's Phsedrus, one of the
characters says : " Here is this lofty and spreading plane-tree, and the
agnus castus high and clustering, and the fullest blossom and the
greatest fragrance; and the stream which flows beneath the plane-
tree is deliriously cool to the feet. . . . How delightful is the breeze;
and there is a sound in the air shrill and summer-like which makes
answer to the cicadas." Here we have, it is true, a flash of the love
of nature. But some centuries later Plutarch refers to this passage as
rather silly. While we are not sure that he is uttering his own senti-
ments, such seems to be the case.

In reading Greek authors we are perpetually confronted by the fact
that they were acute thinkers and poor observers. They used their
minds a great deal more than their senses. When they undertake to
explain phenomena, they usually try to think out an explanation
instead of first taking care that the phenomena in question have been
correctly observed and registered. As for the Romans, not one of
them ever had an original idea except on matters that could be turned
to practical use.

Tacitus, for example, says that north of the Orkneys the waters are
so sluggish, according to report, that they yield with difficulty to the
oar and are not even raised by the wind. He then proceeds to assign as
a probable reason that the extreme depth of the water makes it difficult
to set in motion. Equally lucid is his explanation of the long days in
the same region. Believing that night is produced by shadow, he tells
us that owing to the flatness of the earth the darkness does not rise
sufficiently high to reach the sky and the stars. He did not know that
the nights are equally long. The Greek original from which our word
eclipse is derived means a ' leaving ' or ' departure.' So Herodotus,
when speaking of an eclipse, says, the sun " Suddenly quitted his seat
in the heavens and disappeared, though there were no clouds in
sight, hut the sky was clear and serene." This is quite equal to an
argument I once heard upon the question whether the moon is in-
habited. The rustic logician declared that such could not be the case

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 417

because the people would have no place to go when it began to decrease.
What an immense amount of speculation and calculation the Ptolemaic
system made for the astronomers ! The philosophers all agreed with
Pliny that ' with the mind we see, with the mind we discriminate ' ;
but unfortunately they too often forgot that the mind can not dis-
criminate unless the senses have correctly furnished the facts. So far
as sight is concerned, this is strikingly exemplified in all the work of
the well-known mathematician, Euclid. As he knew nothing about
refraction and had no rational theory of light, he had recourse to phi-
losophy to provide him with a basis for his work on optics, but which
is really a treatise on perspective. So far as is now known, the
first man who made a study of refraction was Posidonius, who lived
nearly two centuries after the father of geometry. He illustrated the
principle by the familiar experiment of placing a coin on the bottom
of an empty vessel in such a way that it was not visible because of the
intervening rim, then bringing it into sight by filling the vessel with
water.

The ancients were almost entirely without apparatus and had no
instruments of precision; in fact, very few of them had any interest
in the mechanic arts. Though Thales foretold an eclipse of the sun
as early as B.C. 600, neither the Greeks nor the Romans had any
way of measuring time that was even approximately accurate. Under
the republic the normal Roman year contained only three hundred and
fifty-five days. Julius Csesar very nearly corrected the error, although
in the time of Pope Gregory XIII., the year had become eleven days
too long. It has ceased to be a matter of controversy whether the
christian era is four years too short. There is hardly any doubt that
the authors of the Homeric Poems had a very undeveloped color-sense.
It is highly probable that two or three millenniums ago the countries
about the Midland Sea, especially the iEgean, displayed to the ap-
preciative beholder many glorious landscapes which the destruction of
the forests and the drying up of the perennial streams have completely
obliterated. Not a few streams that formerly flowed all the year round
have become temporary torrents, more baneful than beneficent in their
effects or beautiful to behold. Many hills that were once covered with
natural vegetation now present a parched and barren appearance. In
the Homeric Poems we find epithets not a few that felicitously de-
scribe natural objects, or at least characterize them, but they are
the result of a happy instinct rather than a careful observation. In
the long ' Hymn to Demeter/ not many lines are given to an enumera-
tion of the flowers that spring so profusely from the bosom of the earth.
The treatment of the subject is perfunctory and superficial. In the
much shorter ' Hymn to the Earth, the Mother of All,' flowers are
barely mentioned and not particularized. In the brilliant descrip-

VOL. LXX. — 27

4i 8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tion of the gardens of Alkinous, the author of the ' Odyssey ' tells
us there " grow tall trees blooming, pear-trees, and pomegranates, and
apple-trees with bright fruit, and sweet figs, and olives and their
blossoms. Some of the fruit is always ripening, yet there is a constant
bloom on the trees and much unripe fruit. There too, skirting the
farthest line, are all manner of garden-beds, that are perpetually fresh."
We have here a sort of combination of orchard and vegetable garden,
for plainly the writer had in mind utility rather than beauty. At
any rate there is nothing in this quotation, in which the author had
literally sent his imagination on its loftiest flights, to indicate that he
knew cultivated flowers. The same may be said of ' Calypso's Isle.'
The Greeks considered crowns of flowers or leaves of some kind indis-
pensable at every banquet and revel. Anacreon, the prince of volup-
tuaries, frequently refers to this well-known custom. The material
of which the wreath was made does not seem to have been regarded as
of primary importance. The symbol only, not the substance, was
essential. According to Xenophon, when some of the ten thousand in
Armenia in the depth of winter were invited to a feast by one of the
native chiefs, the revelers crowned themselves with hay. The will did
duty for the deed. This story reminds one of the Arabs, who are
punctilious in performing the stated ablutions enjoined by the Koran.
But as water is sometimes too precious to be wasted in this way, they
use sand, which, mixed with a liberal amount of credulity, is to the
faithful equally efficacious. The extracts from Homer recall the so-
called hanging gardens of Babylon constructed for Semiramis more
than two thousand years before Christ. These constituted a park built
on an artificial elevation, so that the epithet usually applied to them
would be equally suitable to the grounds at Versailles or the Buttes
Chaumont in Paris — all hung on the ground. The Persian monarchs
and noblemen maintained extensive pleasure-grounds, in which great
quantities of game were enclosed. It is from their designation of these
parks that we get our word Paradise. It comes to us from the Greek,
and is found in nearly all the modern European languages. The
general opinion, however, is that the first parks, in the modern sense
of the term, were the work of the Roman emperors.

Homer has no word for ' color ' nor for any of the primary colors.
In like manner the term usually translated ' black ' is very indefinite.
It is used of the bronzed complexion of Ulysses and of his henchman,
Eurybates; of the ripe grape; of beans; of wine, and of the storm
cloud. We moderns would say that it is strictly applicable in the last
case only; certainly the difference between the hue of the storm cloud
and the darkest complexion of a white man is very marked. Of
Agamemnon it is said that he ' stood weeping like unto a fountain of
dark water that from a beetling cliff poureth down its black stream.'
In the ' Odyssey ' it is said of Ulysses that ' Athena shed great beauty

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 4*9

from his head downwards . . . and from his head caused deep curling
locks to flow like the hyacinth flower.' This comparison, which is
made twice, is absolutely incomprehensible to us, if it has reference to
color. It is also noteworthy that the epithet which is variously trans-
lated ' golden/ ' fair,' ' blond ' is so applied to most of the Greek heroes
and to horses. Evidently the author of the Homeric poems believed
that the Greek nobles did not have the usual dark complexion of the
southern races. Be that as it may, we can not resist the conviction
that in primitive times the various shades of color that made the
same general impression on the sight were named alike. There was
hardly any discrimination of the sensations. Homer's usual method
of designation of colors is by comparison ; hence such words as ' steel-
blue,' ' saffron-colored,' t blood-red,' ' vermilion-cheeked ' are common.
A table has ' dark-blue' feet; the same adjective is also applied to the
prow of a ship, to hair, to a horse's mane and to the eye. Fear is said
to be chloros (of a greenish yellow). Still, this is hardly more curious
or more inexact than Shakspere's ' green-eyed monster,' and the current
phrase ' to turn green with envy.' It is not easy to discover the under-
lying idea. The same epithet is translated ' blood-red ' when applied
to a serpent and ' tawny ' when used of the color of jackals. Though
the Homeric Greeks were in some respects a good deal more advanced
than our Indians, in the appreciation of the beauties of nature, they
were not very wide apart. Henry T. Finck, in his ' Primitive Love,'
adduces plenty of evidence to prove that the " Indians have no con-
ception of the romantic side of nature — of scenery for its own sake.
To them a tree is simply a grouse-perch, or a source of firewood; a
lake, a fish-pond; a mountain, the dreaded abode of evil spirits." He
assures us that the real Indian and the Hiawatha Indian are just as
much alike as fact and fancy. In Homer's circle there was no in-
terest in flowers or blossoms and no mention is made of garlands,
although they played so important a part in the social life of the later
Greeks. When flowers are mentioned at all it is almost solely on ac-
count of their color, which serves as a basis of comparison. One ex-
ception that I recall is the passage where one of Priam's sons is smitten
with an arrow so that : " Even as a garden poppy droopeth its head
aside, being heavy with fruit and the showers of spring; so bowed he
his head aside laden with his helm." The Homeric Poems are su-
premely important for the insight they afford into the early civilization
of the people which they portray, but they contain a great deal that
is repulsive to our far more refined sensibilities. Empedocles speaks
of but four colors: white, black, red and pale green. It is hard to
believe that the age in which this philosopher lived knew at most only
two prismatic colors. It is more probable that he regarded green and
blue, and perhaps some other colors, as derivatives from these and
therefore not entitled to separate enumeration. According to Democ-

42o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ritus, there are but four primitive colors, from which all others are
formed by combination. He seems to have regarded blue and green as
variants of black. Aristotle thought there were only two primitive
colors : light or white and black or dark, and that all others were pro-
duced by a mixture of these. Wide as this is from the mark, it shows
a tendency to simplify natural phenomena, though it would doubtless
be going too far to suspect in this belief an inkling of the composition
of light. In the Old Testament four prismatic colors are mentioned,
three of them very often and yellow four times, three times in Levit-
icus and once in the Psalms. In the former, it is used of hair; in the
latter, of gold. As the Hebrews were surrounded by nations that had
made great advances in technical skill, it is probable likewise that all
of them had made greater advances in the discrimination of colors than
the Greeks.

The fact that the ancients habitually speak of only four colors is
almost proof positive that they did not discriminate more. In addi-
tion to the evidence already cited, there is to be added that of painting.
What is known of the art of Polygnotus, the earliest of the distinguished
painters of antiquity and a contemporary of Pericles, leads to the con-
clusion that he used no greater number, according to the ideas of his
time. Like all early painters he worked on terra-cotta vases and on
walls, not on canvas. It seems highly probable that throughout
antiquity no distinction was made between orange and yellow, nor be-
tween indigo and blue, nor between the darker colors that shade into
black. Many of the lower races, both at home and abroad, share this
defect. Both have also the same liking for what is gaudy and stri-
king. It is probable that the fondness for ' loud ' colors is a species
of survival that may be studied in children and in persons that are
color-blind. The latter defect is a species of arrested development, and
being an organic defect can not be overcome. On the other hand,
some primitive races are reported to exhibit a very acute color-sense.
This mental condition has likewise its analogy among children, some of
whom are indifferent to colors, while in others the color-sense shows
itself very early. At any rate, modern analogies will not enable us
to decide the question for or against any people of antiquity. Two
theories have long been held to account for the poverty of terms to
designate colors in remote times. The one most in harmony with the
evolution hypothesis is that the color-sense has followed the general
law of development; the other, that primitive races perceive colors as
clearly as we do, but that their languages lack words to designate minor
differences. Color-blindness has no connection with mental power in
general. It is well known that the celebrated physicist, John Dalton,
was not capable of distinguishing more than three colors. Many
similar cases are on record. This defect has become known as daltonism
or achromatopsia. A more correctly constructed compound would be

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 421

chromatuphlosis. However, technical terms often lead the philologist
to express the same opinion of them that the devil is said to have used
of the Ten Commandments, " They are a queer lot." In the language
of the Psalmist, " They are fearfully and wonderfully made." Gen-
erally speaking, animals make less use of sight than man; all those
that have been domesticated select their food by the sense of smell and
not by sight. The test may be readily made with blind horses, which
are unfortunately not as rare as they ought to be. Birds, on the other
hand, depend wholly on the sense of sight, which is remarkably acute.1
In ancient accounts of battles, sieges and pestilence, those gruesome
birds that live on corpses are never absent. It may be taken for
granted that the problem, How do we see? exercised the ingenuity of
the ancient thinkers a great deal. It need not surprise us that they
were wide of the mark, seeing that there is as yet no universally
accepted theory of vision. But the moderns have learned that color
is subjective, whereas the ancients regarded it as objective. Lucretius,
who follows the teachings of some of the Greek philosophers, probably
of Empedocles, affirms that very thin films are detached from the
visible object and impinge upon the eye to produce sight. Aristotle
was convinced that there must be some medium between the organ of
sight and the object seen by which the sight-process is mediated.
Lucretius says that persons afflicted with jaundice see everything
yellow because so many atoms of that color fill the orb of sight. He
compares the casting away of films or effigies to the cicada that casts
off its tunic, or the snake that sheds its glossy vesture and to fire that
emits smoke. Much later Locke says : " Since the extension, figure,
number and motion of bodies of an observable bigness may be perceived
at a distance by the sight, it is evident that some singly imperceptible
bodies must come from them to the eye." Lucretius seems to have
observed natural phenomena with unusual care for a Soman, but it
was rather their more violent aspects, such as thunder and lightning,
earthquakes and waterspouts and floods. The phenomena of rain, hail
and snow could of course not escape his attention. It has been shown
above that the ancients, particularly the Greeks, had a very defective
perception of colors and that they had very poor eyes for the beauties
of nature as displayed in scenery. It may be interesting to trace briefly
the growth of this last sentiment, since it is one of the latest phases
of evolution. The Greeks were eminently a social people. They laid

1 1 recently came across the following — how much truth there is in it I
do not know: " Red will annoy a turkey-cock as much as a bull, but a sparrow
will not let it disturb its mind. But if one shakes a blue rag in front of a
caged sparrow's eyes, he will go frantic with disgust. Sparrows, and linnets
too, will refuse food offered to them on a piece of blue paper, and dislike the
appearance of any one wearing a blue dress. Medium light blue affects them
most, but blue serge they scarcely mind at all. Thrushes and blackbirds object
to yellow, but will use red or blue dried grasses left about their haunts to
build the outer layers of their nests. Yellow grasses they let alone."

422 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

great stress upon that urbanity which is acquired only by long associa-
tion of man with man. Greek pedagogy insists that education shall
above all things make the gentleman. Greek thinkers were far more
interested in their fellow men than in their irrational companions or in
the silent creation. It is true Theocritus, and the much later Dio,
praise country life, but they lived in an age that was preeminently
one of books. They commend the simple and unsophisticated manners
of those who keep aloof from the haunts of men more than they ex-
press delight in their rustic surroundings. They do not like nature
so much as they dislike man. Among the Eomans, Virgil and Horace
follow the same course. They either never leave the city or they stay
within easy reach of it. They do as did the usurer whom the latter
portrays in his much-read and often-translated second Epode. After
enumerating the delights of country life and the various vexations of
those who have much to do with men, he ends just where he began —
by staying in the city. This praise of rural life reads as if written by
one who knew but little about it. We find much the same thing in
Germany in Gessner's writings and in England in the age of Anne.
Pope declares :

Happy the man whose wish and care

A few paternal acres bound;
Content to breathe his native air

On his own ground.

Yet he never went farther from London than Virgil or Horace
from Borne. We get curious glimpses into the vagaries of taste when
we trace even in the barest outline the manifestations of what was
supposed to be a love of nature. Virgil's Pastoral poems seem to have
been the original inspiration. We can follow their influence in almost
every country of Europe from the fifteenth to the seventeenth century,
and, to some extent, in the eighteenth. Even the horticultural art
was made subservient to this fantastic taste of which Lenotre was the
chief apostle. Trees and shrubbery were clipped and trained into
artificial forms, and flowers were planted according to geometrical
figures. The aristocracy professed a love for nature, but it was nature
of a very unnatural sort. It is not until we come to Bloomfield and
Crabbe, but especially to Wordsworth, that we find nature and the un-
sophisticated man receiving a genuine poetical treatment by persons
who knew both at first hand and studied them with genuine sympathy.
Walter Scott was likewise an ardent lover of nature and of natural
scenery. Both his poetry and his prose are evidence. His novels con-
tain many elaborate descriptions of scenery that bear the stamp of
verisimilitude. They are the work of a constructive imagination of
the highest order. If Xenophon had had an eye for the beauties of
mountain and plain, of forest and stream, he would have left upon
record his impressions of them rather than the numerous and long
speeches he has handed down to posterity, made for the most part ' out

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 423

of his own head.' If it be alleged in extenuation that the circum-
stances under which his notes were taken were ill suited to the careful
study of external nature, it is to be said in reply that he observed and
recorded what most interested him. His itinerary is so inaccurately,
or at least so sparingly, marked that no modern explorer has been able
to follow or trace it. In view of the fact that the ancients did not
receive as much pleasure from the contemplation of scenery as we
moderns, it is probable that they did not regard blindness or failing
sight as a very serious misfortune. In Schiller's Tell we have a
notable passage describing the frightful misfortune of blindness :

Oh! 'tis a noble gift of Heaven,

The gift of sight, each being lives on light,

And all creation feels its gladding power!

The plants themselves turn joyfull to the light:

To die — is nothing — nothing! but to live,

And not to see — is misery indeed!

The Greeks believed that the power of internal vision was enhanced
by lack of bodily sight. This belief was in accordance with the law of
compensation held by them. Fortune, good or ill, is always outweighed
by its opposite. ' The blind old man of Scio's rocky isle ' was sup-
posed to have been blind because his intellectual insight was pre-
ternaturally acute and accurate. Tiresias, the most famous seer in
Greek legend, is always spoken of as blind. We do not know whether
this preternatural acumen was the result of his want of sight or
whether the latter was a condition precedent to the former. One of
the favorite characters of Greek mythology was CEdipus, spending the
sunset of his life in dignified retirement near Athens under the care of
his daughter Antigone. In early years he had blinded himself after
discovering that he had unwittingly been guilty of incest. The Greeks
did but little by artificial light. They were early risers and all repu-
table people were supposed to retire early. Plato, in his Laws, says the
master and mistress of the household should be the first to rise in the
morning in order to show a good example to the other members. He
further says : " Magistrates who keep awake at night are terrible to the
bad whether enemies or citizens and are honored and revered by the
temperate, and are useful to themselves." Throughout the entire
ancient, medieval and 'modern world, until within comparatively recent
times, the badly lighted or totally dark streets made it a matter of
prudence for honest people to go abroad as little as possible after night-
fall, especially if they carried or were supposed to carry articles of value.
The comparative sameness in the style of clothing gave the footpad the
opportunity to replenish his wardrobe at the expense of his fellow
without saying, ' By your leave.' We are not told that the man who
went down to Jericho was attacked in the night, but we are informed
that he was stripped. That the ancients placed a much higher value on
worn garments than is done by the moderns is shown by the statement

424 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

that the soldiers who kept guard over the body of Christ on the cross
cast lots for his raiment. This was the custom at the execution of
malefactors.

It is curious that the free Greeks were in the habit of rising early,
for, owing to the abundance of slaves, most of them had little compul-
sory work to perform except when on military expeditions. A law
of Solon prohibited teachers from opening school before sunrise or
holding it after sunset. To the casual reader this may sound ridicu:
lous. But to many of our older college graduates, it will occur that
they were required to attend prayers so early in the morning that they
had to be conducted by lamp or candle. An acquaintance of mine who
lived near a certain college used to relate that he well remembered hear-
ing young men pass his house in the dark of the morning who, while
completing the process of dressing, interspersed the performance with
occasional expressions not suitable for ears polite. The mood in which
such persons reached their destination was evidently not well suited
to the spirit of devotion which those early exercises were supposed to
foster.

Many people believe, because they have read in books, that the
sight of the Indians was extraordinarily keen, and that they were able
to descry objects at a greater distance than was possible for white men.
This is an error, if the assertion is to be taken without qualification.
All savages have eyes trained to see those things that are necessary to
their preservation — game and enemies. Their sight is not by nature
more acute than that of the white man, but in some respects it was
better trained. The whites who lived among the Indians and were
compelled to defend themselves against their enemies saw just as far
as their enemies. It may be affirmed as a general principle that there
is nothing a civilized man can not do better than a savage. The latter
uses his reason to aid his instinct; the former makes his instinct sub-
servient to his reason. It is well known that sailors are able to discern
objects at sea at a greater distance than landsmen, but we have to do
here with a faculty that any one can acquire. The Indians did just
what the whites who lived among them did who subsisted on game and
were obliged to be on the constant lookout for enemies. Both had
acquired not merely the power to discern objects, but also training in
the interpretation of the signification of those objects that came within
visible range. It is probable, for reasons given above, that not only
the Indians as well as all tribes living on the same social level, but
also the backwoodsmen, retained their sight to a more advanced age
than is now generally the case; but that the eye of the former was
naturally more powerful than that of the present generation or that
of men in general is unsupported by trustworthy evidence. There is
no doubt that a child born with normal eyes in one of our large cities
can see objects just as far off and define them just as accurately with

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 425

proper training as a person who never saw a dozen houses together. It
is well known, too, that what are sometimes called the lower senses,
touch, taste and smell, are often of extraordinary acuteness in civilized
man as the result of training. If, therefore, any of the senses of our
urban population is feebler than that of the dwellers in the rural dis-
tricts, it is not due to an inherent weakness, but to improper or in-
judicious use.

Since it is evident that the ancients, particularly the Greeks, looked
upon the external world with emotions very different from the moderns,
let us next inquire what means they possessed, if any, for strengthening
the sight or aiding defective vision. The problem has been a good
deal discussed. Those who believe that some sort of apparatus cor-
responding to modern eye-glasses has been in use from almost time
immemorial rely chiefly upon inference, since hardly any direct evi-
dence is forthcoming. It is held by some investigators that the very
large number of seal rings and seal cylinders, both intaglios and
cameos, dating from the remotest times found in the Babylonian tombs,
must be accepted as proof positive that the art of cutting the hardest
precious and other stones was a regular business in that part of the
world, and that this could not have been carried on without some kind
of magnifying lenses. That work of this sort could be performed only
by persons of exceptionally keen eyesight is beyond question : the infer-
ence drawn from modern experience is logical. Yet in the absence of
objects which might reasonably be expected to be forthcoming, we are
constrained to render the verdict ' not proven.' So far as we have
direct testimony, it is all adverse, if the expression be admissible. It
is generally held that the first mention of magnifying glasses is found
in an Arab writer of the eleventh century. Eoger Bacon speaks of
glasses that correct refraction. The epitaph of a certain Salvinus
Armatus in Florence names him as the inventor of spectacles, although
it is also said of the monk Alexander of Spina, that he made use of
eyeglasses. In the year 1488 makers of spectacles are mentioned in
Nuremberg. There is a passage in Scott's ' Quentin Durward ' that
represents Lord Crawford with spectacles on his nose, and the remark
is added that the invention was recent. That artificial aids to sight
are modern is also rendered probable from the lack of a word inherited
from antiquity to designate the apparatus. The English word ' spec-
tacle ' is still used in a sense that differs but little from its Latin parent :
it is something to look at, a stage-play, then the theater itself. But
the earliest English ' spectacle ' is used for spy-glass. It is thence
probable that our plural ' spectacles ' originally meant a pair of spy-
glasses, a sort of anticipated binocular. The French spectacle still
has its original Latin meaning, the form of the word being but slightly
changed. On the other hand, in the German and Scandinavian
languages, Spehtahel is equivalent to what we call a ' rumpus.' But

426 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Brille (spectacles) is from beryllus, the Latin name of a transparent
stone. The French besides also point to beryl. Bericle is an earlier
form of beside for ' besiculum,' a little beryl. In some of the French
dialects the first syllable ber- is still preserved, bnt the Parisian word
for spectacles is besides, in which the original r has been changed to s,
according to a phonetic law traceable in other words also. The Span-
iards, Italians and Russians have each a native word to designate this
article of common use.

There is a passage in Pliny that is usually cited as evidence that
something akin to spectacles must have been in use at least in his
time. He relates that the Emperor Nero used a precious stone which
he calls ' smaragdus,' generally translated ' emerald/ through which he
was accustomed to gaze on the gladiatorial combats; or rather, this is
what he seems to say. There is, however, little doubt that Dr. Magnus,
the latest author to examine the passage critically, is right in holding
that it means no more than that the emperor was in the habit of gazing
upon an emerald which he used to carry with him for the purpose of
resting his eyes when they became tired looking upon shows that were
interesting to him. This view is rendered the more probable from the
belief of antiquity that green has a restful effect upon the eyesight.

Contrivances for bringing the rays of the sun to a focus in order
to produce combustion have been employed almost from time im-
memorial. A curious proposal bearing on this point is made by
Aristophanes in his comedy of the ' Clouds.' Strepsiades, the hero of
the play, is greatly harassed with debts and has not the wherewithal to
pay. He therefore proposes to his master to get a stone at some
chemist's shop of the kind with which they kindle fire, and when the
clerk is entering the suit, to stand at some distance and melt it out.
As the writing tablets then in use were probably thin boards covered
with a still thinner coating of wax on which the writing was done
with a pointed instrument, it would not require great heat to effect the
purpose. Besides, if, as seems to have been the case and custom, burn-
ing-glasses were used to kindle fires, they must have been of consider-
able size even in a country like Greece where the sun shines very hot
most of the year. Moreover, we are told, they were kept in the
chemists' shops for this purpose. If by any mishap the sacred fire
watched over by the Vestal Virgins in Rome went out, it was rekindled
by means of a burning-glass. Polybius, when speaking of the siege of
Syracuse by the Romans, B.C. 214, relates that they were unable to
take it from the side of the sea because of the engines employed
against them by Archimedes, unquestionably the greatest mechanician
of the ancient world. Says he : " So true is it that one man and one
intellect properly qualified for the particular undertaking is a host in
himself and of wonderful efficacy." The Romans were confident that
they could take the city ' if one old man could be got rid of.' He

SIGHT AND SEEING IN ANCIENT TIMES 427

might have added with equal truth that when a man appears in a world
wholly unprepared to comprehend him, not only are his thoughts
neglected, hut his discoveries forgotten. The story that Archimedes set
the ships of the Komans on fire by means of burning-glasses is not
found in any author who lived near his time. Moreover, the captains
of the vessels would hardly be so obliging as to hold their vessels station-
ary in order that the old philosopher might work his will on them.
Yet the marvelous feats he accomplished on the same occasion and
vouched for by credible witnesses are scarcely less incredible. It may
be accepted as certain that Archimedes produced wonderful effects
by means of his lenses, whether they were made of glass or of some
other material. That the ancients as late as the age of Plutarch knew
nothing of spectacles is clear from the negative testimony of this writer,
whose works might be superscribed ' Concerning all Things and Some
Others.' In one of his table talks he tries to explain why old people,
when reading, hold the book at some distance from the eyes. He finds
the reason to lie in Plato's theory of vision, which he also holds. This
philosopher maintained, in common with almost all the thinkers of
antiquity, that sight is produced by a sort of fluid substance passing
from the visible object to the eye, somewhat in the shape of a cone, the
eye being the apex. When the organ becomes weakened by age this
attenuated substance is too intense to permit normal vision ; so in order
to weaken it the object must be held farther away. He finds a con-
firmation of this theory in the habits of those animals that seek their
prey by night when their sight is most acute. The fluid emanating
from the object is too strong to be properly commingled with the power
of vision, as he expresses it, possessed by these animals, but is so weak-
ened and diluted by the surrounding darkness as to enable them to see
at their best. This may seem to us very puerile ; it ceases to be so when
we remember that to this day no one has been able to answer the ques-
tion. How do we see?

Though the art of making glass of certain kinds is very old,
spectacles had to wait on the discovery or invention of some method
that would produce it perfectly transparent. Specimens of glass have
been found in the Egyptian tombs that are more than four thousand
years old, and glass bottles are represented on tombs at least fifteen
hundred years earlier. In Mesopotamia the art of making glass has
been traced for at least two thousand years B. C. But all the glass of
antiquity was of inferior quality and was almost useless for purposes
where the rays of light were to be transmitted unbroken and with
undiminished energy. Mirrors were also made in Egypt thousands of
years before the christian era. The materials used were obsidian,
metal, zinc and silver. Glass mirrors are mentioned by Pliny, but as
they were neither perfectly plane nor foliated they gave back a very
imperfect image and were not much esteemed. The word translated

428 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

' glass ' in King James's version is not as clear as in some of the later
renderings. The passage in the First Epistle to the Corinthians if
read : " As yet we see things dimly, reflected as in a mirror, but then
face to face," makes the sense plain. As looking-glasses, to use this
term by anticipation, were generally made of steel or some other metal,
they readily became tarnished, even when of the best quality; hence
the man who beheld his face ' in a glass ' rarely got a distinct image,
and thus would readily forget the lineaments of his countenance.
That window glass, such as is now in common use, was slow to gain
currency is shown by the little panes in many old buildings in Europe.
They are usually round or nearly so, and so small that one of them can
easily be held between the tips of the ringers and the thumb. That
this form of window glass first came into vogue in Germany is evident
from the name disk (Scheibe) by which a pane of glass is still desig-
nated, no matter what its shape.

That ancient customs are still practised by primitive tribes is in-
terestingly shown by the two following incidents. In the Iliad Ave are
told that when Asklepias ' saw the wound where the bitter arrow had
lighted he sucked out the blood,' and so forth. In his recent work on
the Australian aborigines, John Mathew informs the reader that the
doctor or sacred man made a practise of sucking the part ailected. He
then proceeds : " There seems to be some efficacy in the sucking, for a
friend of mine who was suffering severely from an inveterate, inflamed
eye allowed a black 'doctor' to mouth the eyeball, and the result of
the treatment was immediate relief and speedy cure." A further paral-
lelism between the rise and practise of the healing art and the priestly
class, although in Greece the connection was less close than elsewhere
and did not long continue, i"s shown by this extract.

The reading habit is essentially modern and may be said to date
from the rise of periodicals, comparatively few of which are more than
half a century old. The invention of spectacles and that of printing
were very nearly coeval. Until that date literary instruction was largely
a matter of dictation, repetition and memorizing, as is still the case
in many parts of the world. Among the ancient Greeks and Komans
the memory was trained to a far greater extent than with us. In the
literature of the former there is constantly evident a sort of distrust
of the written page. It could not reflect the vivifying power of the
living voice. It seems to have been a common thing for Greek youths
to learn Homer by heart, huge as the task would be to us. Knowledge
was to be elicited by discussion, by the dialectic method, by question
and answer. Intellectual training was almost exclusively rhetorical.
Taking into consideration, therefore, the fact that eyes were not needed
for the manufacture and use of instruments of precision and that the
printed page did not exist, we can easily understand that spectacles
were not greatly missed.

THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ARTS 429

THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ARTS

By Professor IRA W. HOWERTH

THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO

nnHE conventional classification of the arts into useful, mechanic
-•- or industrial, and liberal, polite or fine is unscientific. It will
not stand before even a superficial examination. Fine and useful are
by no means mutually exclusive terms. The fine arts are useful, and
the useful arts should be fine. The art that paints a picture or chisels
a statue satisfies the desire for beauty. It is, therefore, useful for the
same reason that cooking or farming or making shoes is useful. All
that the word useful implies is satisfaction of desire, and this is the
object of all the arts. On the other hand, the word fine, as applied to
art, does not signify the absence of utility, but merely that the art has
been brought to a certain degree of perfection (polite-polished), and
that its practise is associated with gentility. There is no inherent
reason why a useful art may not become a fine art. Obviously, then,
the division of the arts into fine and useful is not dichotomous. One
might as well divide the sciences into practical and interesting.

But are not the fine arts to be distinguished from the useful arts
on the ground that the former involve the use of the imagination and
the realization of the beautiful? It is true, of course, that the fine
arts are par excellence the imaginative arts, and that they minister
chiefly to the esthetic sense. Still, even this fact does not distinguish
them wholly from the useful or industrial arts. Intelligence, imagina-
tion and pleasure are elements to be found in all the arts. Art really
implies intelligence, and it is clear that imagination and pleasure may
enter into invention as well as into the so-called creative arts.

What, then, is the basis of the familiar classification? It is the
relative historical circumstances under which the respective arts origi-
nated and have been developed. The useful, mechanic or industrial
arts are allied to productive labor, and their history is the history of
labor; while the liberal, polite or fine arts have always been associated
with leisure and culture.

Now productive labor, as everybody knows who is in the least
familiar with industrial history, was originally imposed by the con-
quering upon the conquered. It was a function of the slave. Hence
to labor has attached the odium of slavery. A life of productive labor
was, in the earlier history of mankind, prima facie evidence of subjec-
tion and inferiority. This was true not only among barbarians, but

430 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

also among the peoples most highly civilized. In Athens, for instance,
all work was assigned to slaves. Among the nobility in Lacedemonia
the women were not allowed to spin or weave for fear of degrading their
rank. In Eome the trades were called the dirty arts (sordidce artes).
Plato and Cicero were alike in regarding the useful occupations as
degrading. Even the ' chosen people ' imagined that to eat one's bread
in the sweat of one's face is one of the severest curses, while people of
modern times do not fully realize that under fair conditions it is a
blessing, and that under almost any conditions it is better than to eat
one's bread in the sweat of another's face. With such ideas of labor it
is not surprising that the arts identified with it, or associated with it in
thought, should be put in a class by themselves.

On the other hand, leisure being originally, as it is now in some
quarters, a badge of respectability, the arts of the leisure class have
naturally partaken of this distinction and been regarded as superior to
the useful arts. The leisure class could not display its freedom from
toil more aptly than by pursuing arts not essential to physical existence.
Hence, while all the arts were originally useful, the arts to which
members of the leisure class were drawn were those least obviously so.
They selected those arts which could be pursued only by those who
could command their own time. Hence, painting, sculpture, music,
poetry and the like were properly called the elegant, that is, the elected,
arts, and they soon came to hold the same relation in thought to the
useful arts as the leisure class held to the laboring class.

This, then, is the explanation of the long-accepted division of the
arts into fine and useful : the monopolization of the fine arts by the
leisure class, and the compulsory practise of the useful arts by the slave,
the serf and the wage laborer. It is a division based primarily upon a
class distinction. The fine arts, speaking generally, involve a greater
play of the imagination, a freer expression of individuality, more
pleasure than the useful arts, but this is due to the greater leisure and
freedom of those who monopolized them as well as to the nature of those
arts themselves. If laborers in the industrial arts had more freedom,
culture and leisure, and the conditions of their work were made con-
ducive to pleasure, these arts would become fine arts ; not so ' fine ' as
painting and sculpture, perhaps, but fine arts, nevertheless. ' Work
without art,' said Euskin, and by this I suppose he meant work unac-
companied by pleasure, ' is brutality.' But work ought not to be
divorced from art. The joy and beauty now associated with the fine
arts must become elements of the useful arts as well. " Beauty must
come back to the useful arts," said Emerson, " and the distinction
between the fine and the useful arts be forgotten. If history were truly
told, if life were nobly spent, it would no longer be easy or possible to

THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ARTS 43 1

distinguish the one from the other. In nature all is useful, all is
beautiful."'1

We submit, then, that the commonly accepted classification of the
arts is an arbitrary one. Its foundation, the supposedly ignoble char-
acter of productive labor, is a false idea. Labor, not leisure, is the real
badge of dignity. ' The stone which the builders refused is become
the headstone of the corner.' Hence the old classification of the arts,
a classification which tends to disparage labor, is an anachronism, and
an impertinence. It is, in a way, a gratuitous reflection upon the
laboring class.

Before proceeding to reclassify the arts, let us carefully define the
scope of art. The word art usually suggests the fine arts. " ' Work
of art ' to most people," says Huxley, " means a picture, a statue, or a
piece of bijouterie ; by way of compensation ' artist ' has included in
its wide embrace cooks and ballet girls, no less than painters and sculp-
tors."2 The word art properly includes ' all the works of man's hands,
from a flint implement to a cathedral or a chronometer.' It embraces
all phenomena in which intelligence plays the part of conscious and
immediate cause. The supplement of art is nature. Art includes
everything not embraced by nature.

The field of the arts being thus defined, we may now construct our
classification.

All arts are alike in this — their medium is matter. No art can free
itself wholly from material things. Some arts, as music and poetry,
may seem to do so, for the ideal elements of these arts predominate to
such an extent that we forget the material by which they are made
manifest — writing and printing materials, musical instruments and
sound waves. No matter how idealistic an art may be, it must still
deal with matter.

This being the case, a logical classification of the arts may be based
upon a classification of material phenomena. And if this latter is an
evolutionary classification, that is, if it proceeds from the simple to the
complex, the resulting classification of the arts will be in the order of
complexity and potential utility. It will also be a classification in
which each art will be a means to those above it, that is, a classification
of superiority and subordination.

Now one of the most obvious divisions of the material world is into
the inorganic, the organic and the superorganic. From the standpoint
of evolution these divisions rank in the order named — the organic is
higher than the inorganic, and the superorganic higher than the or-
ganic. Each division furnishes the material upon which is exercised

1 ' Essays,' First Series, Essay XII., Art.

1 ' Evolution and Ethics, and Other Essays,' authorized edition, New York,
1899, p. 10, foot-note.

432 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

a special class of arts. There are arts which deal with wood, stone and
iron (lifeless elements), arts that deal with living things, and arts that
deal with organized groups of men, or societies. Hence there are three
grand divisions of the arts corresponding to the three grand divisions of
the material world. Simplifying our terminology, we may call them
the physical arts, the vital arts and the social arts.

The physical arts are relatively the lowest. The material upon
which they are employed is passive. It ( stays put.' The principles
underlying these arts are extremely simple. The mechanical prin-
ciples, for instance, are seven in number. They may indeed be re-
duced to two — the lever and the inclined plane. Historically probably,
as well as analytically, the art of making and using tools comes first.
The primitive man who chipped his arrow-head from a piece of flint,
and fashioned the shaft of his arrow from a stick of wood, employed
art. He was an artist. If in the practise of his art he manifested no
sense of beauty, it was due to the pressing demands of the more
imperative desires rather than to the absence of the esthetic sense.
What birds and beasts, and even insects, possess must have been present
in the lowest of men. Archeology shows that even the cave-dweller
tried his hand occasionally at the purely decorative arts. But the first
arts were the hand arts — manufacture, in the strict sense of that word.

As intelligence increased, and inventive genius was applied, hand-
making grew into machine-making. The machine is a combination of
tools in the operation of which a natural force, like wind, water, steam
or electricity, is usually employed. The machine arts are more com-
plex than the hand arts. Their social potentiality is greater. Their
object, like that of the hand arts, is not necessarily the production of
articles of vulgar utility only. It may be idealistic in the highest
degree. The various fine arts must fall under one division or the other.
Hand-making (manufacture) and machine-making (machino-facture)
completely cover the realm of the physical arts. Under the first are
the manual occupations (handicrafts), and under the second the
mechanical occupations, imperfectly designated ' the trades.'

Now, the physical arts that minister to the vulgar wants, or needs,
of mankind have reached a high degree of perfection. They are to-day
the theater for the display of the highest reaches of inventive genius.
A watch, a locomotive, a printing-press, are marvels of ingenuity. We
do not wonder that untutored men have worshiped a watch as a su-
perior being. A printing-press, working automatically, will print, fold
and deliver twelve thousand twenty-four-page papers in an hour.
Machines in almost every industry turn out articles which in quantity,
regularity and delicacy of form could not possibly be produced by hand.
But the object of these arts has been quantity rather than quality,
mercantile utility rather than beauty. Salability has been their main

THE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ARTS 433

consideration. They have been the instruments of trade and gain,
rather than the ministers of joy and life. They have thus been de-
graded. They are the Cinderella of the household of art. None the
less they are noble; and when clothed in beauty, as some day, let us
hope, they will be, they will win their full share of admiration and
devotion. The repulsion which some profess to feel toward the machine
arts is based upon a misconception. It is not these arts which should
excite disdain: it is the purpose for which they are employed and the
conditions under which they are practised. They could free men from
drudgery if properly used; they outrank the genii of fable in serving
their master ; and they are not in themselves incompatible with pleasure
and beauty. But as industrial conditions are to-day, men are not the
masters of the machine. They are enslaved by it. Machinery has
more slaves than any dominant class ever possessed. Thus it has been,
and thus it will be as long as men are ' an appendage to profit-grind-
ing.' Once free men from the machine, give them leisure and culture,
and the machine arts will become fine arts. Under normal conditions
the element of the beautiful would manifest itself in all work, mechan-
ical or manual, because man is a beauty-loving animal.

It appears, then, that the arts now known as the fine arts must, in
our present classification, be distributed among the handicrafts and
the mechanical occupations, since they have been selected out because
of their idealistic character. They are physical arts, because, like all
such arts, they realize the ideal by the exercise of manual or mechanical
operations upon brute matter. The artist who paints a picture em-
ploys pigment and canvas and brush. To be sure he is supposed to
' mix his paint with brains/ but there is nothing essentially unique in
this. Mortar should be so mixed — and dough. The sculptor uses stone
and a chisel. The mechanical part of his work is turned over to the
machine, from which he himself is free. His art differs in no inherent
and absolute respect from that of the industrial artist. Carving a
statue to please the eye ought not to differentiate the ' artist ' from the
laborer who carves a chair to relieve us of ' that tired feeling.' If the
one act is accompanied by pleasure, and a manifestation of the beauti-
ful, while the other is not, it is due to factitious circumstances.

It is not to be denied, of course, that the fine arts are the most highly
cultivated of all the arts. Their possibilities have, perhaps, been more
completely realized than those of the other arts. Certainly this is true
with respect to the vital and the social arts. They have drawn to them-
selves much of the talent freed from the grosser forms of labor. They
have touched the highest levels of skill in execution, and of idealistic
conception. Zeuxis, it is said, imitated nature so successfully that the
birds pecked at his painted grapes, while Parrhasius, his Athenian
rival, deceived with his pictured curtain even the practised eye of

VOL. LXX. — 28

434 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Zeuxis himself. Every museum des beaux artes evidences lofty flights
in the realm of the ideal. Some profess to believe that the climax of
art has been reached, that Grecian art will never be surpassed. This is
a gratuitous assumption. The soil of art is freedom, leisure and cul-
ture; its light and warmth and moisture, appreciation. If men were
freed from grinding toil, if the industrial arts had become fine arts,
and art appreciation were a common heritage, the growth of even the
more imaginative arts would receive an impetus hitherto unfelt, and
achieve a development as yet unrealized.

We have now analyzed the physical arts, the arts which deal with
non-living matter. They are divided into manufacture, which em-
braces the handicrafts, and machinofacture, which includes the mechan-
ical occupations. There is no need of a third class to embrace the fine
arts, since these are at bottom manual or mechanical, and their fineness
is due to the circumstances under which they have been cultivated.
Ideally all arts are fine. We now pass to the vital arts.

The world of life is divided into plants and animals. The arts
corresponding to these two divisions are the botanical and the zoological.
The botanical arts realize the ideal in plant life; the zoological, in
animal life. To the former belong agriculture, horticulture, and the
like, and to the latter the domestication, breeding and training of ani-
mals, and the education of man. It might be more complimentary
and gratifying to the human animal if the arts pertaining to his devel-
opment were given a class by themselves. This may be done, if it is
insisted upon. They would be called, of course, the anthropological
arts.

Now, the vital arts, dealing as they do with a higher because more
complex form of matter, are superior to the physical arts. It will seem
strange and illogical at first thought to find farming ranked above
music, and gardening above painting. And there is, of course, an ele-
ment of absurdity in it if we think of the botanical arts as they are
usually practised. They are empirical. Their possibilities of use and
beauty have only begun to be appreciated. They bear about the same
relation to what they might be, as a chant of the Igorrotes does to a
Wagnerian opera. There is not a nation on the globe that has given,
or is now giving, as much scientific attention to farming as to fighting.
Hence the farmer is still a ' hayseed,' and the fighter a tailor's model.
But if we think of these arts as they might become — as sustaining a
populous world and clothing it with new forms of life and beauty —
our estimate will change. If, as we read, Mr. Burbank has developed
new species of flowers and fruit, and has produced a spineless cactus
which is to be the means of reclaiming the arid regions of the west, he
has revealed some of the possibilities of the botanical arts, and done
much to remove the stigma that has attached to the cultivation of the

TEE CLASSIFICATION OF THE ARTS 435

soil. Breeders and fanciers are showing what can be done to mold
animal life into preconceived forms. They " habitually speak of an
animal's organization," says Darwin, " as something plastic, which they
can model almost as they please." " It would seem," said Lord Somer-
ville, " as if they had chalked out upon a wall a form perfect in itself,
and then had given it existence."3 Is it less difficult to fashion the
ideal in flesh than in clay ? The fine arts have been called the ' creative
arts.' But the botanical and zoological arts, which are capable of
bringing into existence new forms of life, ideal forms, differing in size,
shape, color and character from anything that nature has produced, are
also creative arts. They continue and supplement the work of the
Creator. There seems no absurdity, then, in ranking above the art
that paints a flower the art that can produce one; above the art that
beguiled the birds, the art that can change the leopard's spots.

At the head of the vital arts is the art which seeks to realize the
ideal in the life and character of individual men. Man is an animal, a
paragon, if you please, and the i beauty of the world,' but still an
animal. The arts devoted to his physical, mental and moral improve-
ment are, strictly speaking, zoological. They are the highest of the
vital arts because they deal with the highest form of life, and outrank
all below them in possibilities. The ideal man realized in the flesh,
which is the object of these arts, would exceed in beauty and beneficent
influence anything that is possible to the painter's brush or the sculptor's
chisel. The totality of these arts may be embraced by the word
education.

Education employs all lower arts as means. It rests upon them and
requires a knowledge of their principles. To educate demands the
highest type of mind. It is an art which the world has never prop-
erly estimated or appreciated. When ranked as an art at all it has been
placed below the fine arts, whereas, when made a fine art itself, it is
immeasurably above them. To be sure, there are few who have made
it such. The great educational artists may be counted on one's fingers.
Each of these men has been as one born out of time. But when the
art of education is duly appreciated the world will find a place in its
Temple of Fame for such artists as Pestalozzi and Froebel, Herbart
and Horace Mann, and the other great teachers who have striven to
make the word flesh that it might dwell among men. Education
should always be, and should always have been, a fine art.

We now come to the third and last division of the arts, the social
arts. The ultimate end of all the arts is a perfected humanity. Hence,
in one sense, all the arts are social arts. Here, however, we include only
the arts which have for their immediate end the improvement of society,
which deal with society as the next lower arts deal with the individ-

8 See Darwin, ' Origin of Species,' Chap. I.

436

. POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ual — man, lower animal or plant. The social arts are in reality one art.
They are the art of employing all other arts in the realization of an
ideal social conception. This art might also be called education, since
we speak of the education of the race as well as the education of the
individual. It might be called government, if that word were not
vitiated by its associations. Professor Lester F. Ward employs the
word sociocracy. " This general social art," he says, " the scientific
control of the social forces by the collective mind of society for its
advantage, in strict homology with the practical arts of the industrial
world, is what I have hitherto given the name Sociocracy."* Call it
what we may, this social art is the highest of all the arts. Its end is
a perfected humanity. In realizing this end it utilizes all other arts.
It is the art of arts. Its application requires the maximum of intelli-
gence and skill. Its potentialities are as yet undreamed of.

The main divisions and subdivisions of the arts having now been
passed briefly in review, it will be helpful to bring them together in
tabular form. They will stand as follows:

Art

1. Physical

2. Vital

J Manufacture
\ Machinofacture

Botanical
Zoological

f Handicrafts.

\ Mechanical occupations.

3. Social -{ Sociocracy.

Agriculture.

Horticulture, etc.
f Domestication, breeding and training.
\ Education.

*' Outlines of Sociology,' New York, 1898, p. 292.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 437

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

Chapter IX. The Future of Mathematical Physics

By m. h. poincare

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

The Principles and Experiment. — In the midst of so much ruin,
what remains standing? The principle of least action is hitherto
intact, and Larmor appears to believe that it will long survive the
others; in reality, it is still more vague and more general.

In presence of this general collapse of the principles, what attitude
will mathematical physics take? And first, before too much excite-
ment, it is proper to ask if all that is really true. All these deroga-
tions to the principles are encountered only among infinitesimals;
the microscope is necessary to see the Brownian movement; electrons
are very light; radium is very rare, and one never has more than some
milligrams of it at a time. And, then, it may be asked whether, besides
the infinitesimal seen, there was not another infinitesimal unseen
counterpoise to the first.

So there is an interlocutory question, and, as it seems, only experi-
ment can solve it. We shall, therefore, only have to hand over the
matter to the experimenters, and, while waiting for them to finally
decide the debate, not to preoccupy ourselves with these disquieting
problems, and to tranquilly continue our work as if the principles were
still uncontested. Certes, we have much to do without leaving the
domain where they may be applied in all security; we have enough
to employ our activity during this period of doubts.

The Bole of the Analyst. — And as to these doubts, is it indeed true
that we can do nothing to disembarrass science of them? It must
indeed be said, it is not alone experimental physics that has given birth
to them; mathematical physics has well contributed. It is the experi-
menters who have seen radium throw out energy, but it is the theorists
who have put in evidence all the difficulties raised by the propagation
of light across a medium in motion; but for these it is probable we
should not have become conscious of them. Well, then, if they have
done their best to put us into this embarrassment, it is proper also
that they help us to get out of it.

They must subject to critical examination all these new views I
have just outlined before you, and abandon the principles only after
having made a loyal effort to save them. What can they do in this
sense ? That is what I will try to explain.

43« POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

It is a question before all of endeavoring to obtain a more satis-
factory theory of the electrodynamics of bodies in motion. It is there
especially, as I have sufficiently shown above, that difficulties accumu-
late. It is useless to heap up hypotheses, we can not satisfy all the
principles at once; so far, one has succeeded in safeguarding some
only on condition of sacrificing the others; but all hope of obtaining
better results is not yet lost. Let us take, then, the theory of Lorentz,
turn it in all senses, modify it little by little, and perhaps everything
will arrange itself.

Thus in place of supposing that bodies in motion undergo a
contraction in the sense of the motion, and that this contraction is the
same whatever be the nature of these bodies and the forces to which
they are otherwise subjected, could we not make a more simple and
natural hypothesis? We might imagine, for example, that it is the
ether which is modified when it is in relative motion in reference to
the material medium which penetrates it, that, when it is thus modi-
fied, it no longer transmits perturbations with the same velocity in
every direction. It might transmit more rapidly those which are
propagated parallel to the motion of the medium, whether in the same
sense or in the opposite sense, and less rapidly those which are propa-
gated perpendicularly. The wave surfaces would no longer be spheres,
but ellipsoids, and we could dispense with that extraordinary contrac-
tion of all bodies.

I cite this only as an example, since the modifications that might
be essayed would be evidently susceptible of infinite variation.

Aberration and Astronomy. — It is possible also that astronomy
may some day furnish us data on this point; she it was in the main
who raised the question in making us acquainted with the phenomenon
of the aberration of light. If we make crudely the theory of aberra-
tion, we reach a very curious result. The apparent positions of the
stars differ from their real positions because of the earth's motion, and
as this motion is variable, these apparent positions vary. The real
position we can not ascertain, but we can observe 1?he variations of the
apparent position. The observations of the aberration show us, there-
fore, not the earth's motion, but the variations of this motion; they
can not, therefore, give us information about the absolute motion of
the earth.

At least this is true in first approximation, but the case would be
no longer the same if we could appreciate the thousandths of a second.
Then it would be seen that the amplitude of the oscillation depends
not alone on the variation of the motion, a variation which is well
known, since it is the motion of our globe on its elliptic orbit, but on
the mean value of this motion, so that the constant of aberration would
not be quite the same for all the stars, and the differences would
tell us the absolute motion of the earth in space.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 439

This, then, would be, under another form, the ruin of the prin-
ciple of relativity. We are far, it is true, from appreciating the
thousandth of a second, but, after all, say some, the earth's total abso-
lute velocity is perhaps much greater than its relative velocity with
respect to the sun. If, for example, it were 300 kilometers per second
in place of 30, this would suffice to make the phenomenon observable.

I believe that in reasoning thus one admits a too simple theory of
aberration. Michelson has shown us, I have told you, that the phys-
ical procedures are powerless to put in evidence absolute motion; I
am persuaded that the same will be true of the astronomic procedures,
however far precision be carried.

However that may be, the data astronomy will furnish us in this
regard will some day be precious to the physicist. Meanwhile, I be-
lieve that the theorists, recalling the experience of Michelson, may
anticipate a negative result, and that they would accomplish a useful
work in constructing a theory of aberration which would explain this
in advance.

Electrons and Spectra. — This dynamics of electrons can be ap-
proached from many sides, but among the ways leading thither is
one which has been somewhat neglected, and yet this is one of those
which promise us the most surprises. It is movements of electrons
which produce the lines of the emission spectra ; this is proved by the
Zeeman effect; in an incandescent body what vibrates is sensitive to
the magnet, therefore electrified. This is a very important first point,
but no one has gone farther. Why are the lines of the spectrum dis-
tributed in accordance with a regular law? These laws have been
studied by the experimenters in their least details ; they are very precise
and comparatively simple. A first study of these distributions recalls
the harmonics encountered in acoustics; but the difference is great.
Not only are the numbers of vibrations not the successive multiples of
a single number, but we do not even find anything analogous to the
roots of those transcendental equations to which we are led by so
many problems of mathematical physics: that of the vibrations of an
elastic body of any form, that of the Hertzian oscillations in a gen-
erator of any form, the problem of Fourier for the cooling of a solid
body.

The laws are simpler, but they are of wholly other nature, and to
cite only one of these differences, for the harmonics of high order, the
number of vibrations tends toward a finite limit, instead of increasing
indefinitely.

That has not yet been accounted for, and I believe that there we
have one of the most important secrets of nature. A Japanese physi-
cist, M. Nagaoka, has recently proposed an explanation; according to
him, atoms are composed of a large positive electron surrounded by a

440 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ring formed of a very great number of very small negative electrons.
Such is the planet Saturn with its rings. This is a very interest-
ing attempt, but not yet wholly satisfactory; this attempt should be
renewed. We will penetrate, so to speak, into the inmost recess of
matter. And from the particular point of view which we to-day
occupy, when we know why the vibrations of incandescent bodies differ
thus from ordinary elastic vibrations, why the electrons do not behave
like the matter which is familiar to us, we shall better comprehend the
dynamics of electrons and it will be perhaps more easy for us to
reconcile it with the principles.

Conventions Preceding Experiment. — Suppose, now, that all these
efforts fail, and, after all, I do not believe they will, what must be
done? Will it be necessary to seek to mend the broken principles by
giving what we French call a coup de pouce f That evidently is always
possible, and I retract nothing of what I have said above.

Have you not written, you might say if you wished to seek a quarrel
with me — have you not written that the principles, though of experi-
mental origin, are now unassailable by experiment because they have
become conventions? And now you have just told us that the most
recent conquests of experiment put these principles in danger.

Well, formerly I was right and to-day I am not wrong. Formerly
I was right, and what is now happening is a new proof of it. Take,
for example, the calorimetric experiment of Curie on radium. Is it
possible to reconcile it with the principle of the conservation of energy ?
This has been attempted in many ways; but there is among them
one I should like you to notice; this is not the explanation which
tends to-day to prevail, but it is one of those which have been pro-
posed. It has been conjectured that radium was only an intermediary,
that it only stored radiations of unknown nature which flashed through
space in every direction, traversing all bodies, save radium, without
being altered by this passage and without exercising any action upon
them. Radium alone took from them a little of their energy and
afterward gave it out to us in various forms.

What an advantageous explanation, and how convenient ! First,
it is unverifiable and thus irrefutable. Then again it will serve to
account for any derogation whatever to Mayer's principle; it answers
in advance not only the objection of Curie, but all the objections that
future experimenters might accumulate. This new and unknown
energy would serve for everything.

This is just what I said, and therewith we are shown that our
principle is unassailable by experiment.

But then, what have we gained by this stroke? The principle is
intact, but thenceforth of what use is it? It enabled us to foresee
that in such or such circumstance we could count on such a total

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 44 1

quantity of energy; it limited us; but now that this indefinite provi-
sion of new energy is placed at our disposal, we are no longer limited
by anything; and, as I have written in 'Science and Hypothesis,' if
a principle ceases to be fecund, experiment without contradicting it
directly will nevertheless have condemned it.

Future Mathematical Physics. This, therefore, is not what would
have to he done; it would be necessary to rebuild anew. If we were
reduced to this necessity, we could moreover console ourselves. It
would not be necessary thence to conclude that science can weave only
a Penelope's web, that it can raise only ephemeral structures, which it
is soon forced to demolish from top to bottom with its own hands.

As I have said, we have already passed through a like crisis. I
have shown you that in the second mathematical physics, that of the
principles, we find traces of the first, that of central forces; it will be
just the same if we must know a third. Just so with the animal that
exuviates, that breaks its too narrow carapace and makes itself a fresh
one, under the new envelope one will recognize the essential traits of
the organism which have persisted.

We can not foresee in what way we are about to expand; perhaps
it is the kinetic theory of gases which is about to undergo develop-
ment and serve as model to the others. Then the facts which first
appeared to us as simple thereafter would be merely resultants of a
very great number of elementary facts which only the laws of chance
would make cooperate for a common end. Physical law would then
assume an entirely new aspect; it would no longer be solely a differ-
ential equation, it would take the character of a statistical law.

Perhaps, too, we shall have to construct an entirely new mechanics
that we only succeed in catching a glimpse of, where, inertia increasing
with the velocity, the velocity of light would become an impassable
limit. The ordinary mechanics, more simple, would remain a first
approximation, since it would be true for velocities not too great, so
that the old dynamics would still be found under the new. We should
not have to regret having believed in the principles, and even, since
velocities too great for the old formulas would always be only excep-
tional, the surest way in practise would be still to act as if we continued
to believe in them. They are so useful, it would be necessary to keep
a place for them. To determine to exclude them altogether would be to
deprive oneself of a precious weapon. I hasten to say in conclusion
that we are not yet there, and as yet nothing proves that the principles
will not come forth from out the fray victorious and intact.1

1 These considerations on mathematical physics are borrowed from my
St. Louis address.

442 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

PART THIRD. The Objective Value op Science

Chapter X. Is Science Aetificial?
§ 1. The Philosophy of M. LeRoy

There are many reasons for being sceptics; should we push this
scepticism to the very end or stop on the way? To go to the end is
the most tempting solution, the easiest, and that which many have
adopted, despairing of saving anything from the shipwreck.

Among the writings inspired by this tendency it is proper to place
in the first rank those of M. LeRoy. This thinker is not only a
philosopher and a writer of the greatest merit, but he has acquired a
deep knowledge of the exact and physical sciences, and even has shown
rare powers of mathematical invention. Let us recapitulate in a few
words his doctrine, which has given rise to numerous discussions.

Science consists only of conventions, and to this circumstance
solely does it owe its apparent certitude; the facts of science and, a
fortiori, its laws are the artificial work of the scientist; science there-
fore can teach us nothing of the truth; it can only serve us as rule of
action.

Here we recognize the philosophic theory known under the name
of nominalism; all is not false in this theory; its legitimate domain
must be left it, but out of this it should not be allowed to go.

This is not all; M. LeRoy's doctrine is not only nominalistic ; it
has besides another characteristic which it doubtless owes to M. Berg-
son, it is anti-intellectualistic. According to M. LeRoy, the intellect
deforms all it touches, and that is still more true of its necessary in-
strument ' discourse.' There is reality only in our fugitive and chan-
ging impressions, and even this reality, when touched, vanishes.

And yet M. LeRoy is not a sceptic; if he regards the intellect as
incurably powerless, it is only to give more scope to other sources of
knowledge, to the heart for instance, to sentiment, to instinct or to
faith.

However great my esteem for M. LeRoy's talent, whatever the
ingenuity of this thesis, I can not wholly accept it. Certes, I am in
accord on many points with M. LeRoy, and he has even cited, in
support of his view, various passages of my writings which I am by
no means disposed to reject. I think myself only the more bound to
explain why I can not go with him all the way.

M. LeRoy often complains of being accused of scepticism. He
could not help being, though this accusation is probably unjust. Are
not appearances against him? Nominalist in doctrine, but realist at
heart, he seems to escape absolute nominalism only by a desperate act
of faith.

The fact is that anti-intellectualistic philosophy in rejecting

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 443

analysis and ' discourse/ just by that condemns itself to being intrans-
missible, it is a philosophy essentially internal, or, at the very least,
only its negations can be transmitted; what wonder then that for an
external observer it takes the shape of scepticism?

Therein lies the weak point of this philosophy; if it strives to
remain faithful to itself, its energy is spent in a negation and a cry of
enthusiasm. Each author may repeat this negation and this cry, may
vary their form, but without adding anything.

And yet, would it not be more logical in remaining silent? See,
you have written long articles ; for that, it was necessary to use words.
And therein have you not been much more * discursive ' and con-
sequently much farther from life and truth than the animal who
simply lives without philosophizing? Would not this animal be the
true philosopher?

However, because no painter has made a perfect portrait, should we
conclude that the best painting is not to paint ? When a zoologist dis-
sects an animal, certainly he ' alters it.' Yes, in dissecting it, he con-
demns himself to never know all of it; but in not dissecting it, he
would condemn himself to never know anything of it and consequently
to never see anything of it.

Certes, in man are other forces besides his intellect, no one has
ever been mad enough to deny that. The first comer makes these
blind forces act or lets them act; the philosopher must speak of them;
to speak of them, he must know of them the little that can be known,
he should therefore see them act. How? With what eyes, if not
with his intellect? Heart, instinct, may guide it, but not render it
useless; they may direct the look, but not replace the eye. It may be
granted that the heart is the workman, and the intellect only the
instrument. Yet is it an instrument not to be done without, if not for
action, at least for philosophizing. Therefore a philosopher really
anti-intellectualistic is impossible. Perhaps we shall have to declare
for the supremacy of action; always it is our intellect which will thus
conclude; in allowing precedence to action it will thus retain the
superiority of the thinking reed. This also is a supremacy not to be
disdained.

Pardon these brief reflections and pardon also their brevity, scarcely
skimming the question. The process of intellectualism is not the sub-
ject I wish to treat: I wish to speak of science, and about it there is
no doubt; by definition, so to speak, it will be intellectualistic or it
will not be at all. Precisely the question is, whether it will be.

§ 2. Science, Rule of Action
For M. LeRoy, science is only a rule of action. We are powerless
to know anything and yet we are launched, we must act, and at all

444 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

hazards we have established rules. It is the aggregate of these rules
that is called science.

It is thus that men, desirous of diversion, have instituted rules
of play, like those of tric-trac for instance, which, better than science
itself, could rely upon the proof by universal consent. It is thus like-
wise that, unable to choose, but forced to choose, we toss up a coin,
head or tail to win.

The rule of tric-trac is indeed a rule of action like science, but
does any one think the comparison just and not see the difference?
The rules of the game are arbitrary conventions, and the contrary
convention might have been adopted, ivhich would have been none the
Jess good. On the contrary, science is a rule of action which is suc-
cessful, generally at least, and I add, while the contrary rule would
not have succeeded.

If I say, to make hydrogen cause an acid to act on zinc, I formu-
late a rule which succeeds; I could have said, make distilled water
act on gold; that also would have been a rule, only it would not have
succeeded. If therefore scientific ' recipes ' have a value, as rule of
action, it is because we know they succeed, generally at least. But to
know this is to know something and then why tell us we can know
nothing ?

Science foresees, and it is because it foresees, that it can be useful
and serve as rule of action. I well know that its previsions are often
contradicted by the event; that shows that science is imperfect and if
I add that it will always remain so, I am certain that this is a
prevision which, at least, will never be contradicted. Always the
scientist is less often mistaken than a prophet who should predict at
random. Besides the progress though slow is continuous, so that
scientists, though more and more bold, are less and less misled. This
is little, but it is enough.

I well know that M. LeEoy has somewhere said that science was
mistaken oftener than one thought, that comets sometimes played
tricks on astronomers, that scientists, who apparently are men, did
not willingly speak of their failures and that, if they should speak of
them, they would have to count more defeats than victories.

That day, M. LeRoy evidently overreached himself. If science did
not succeed, it could not serve as rule of action; whence would it get
its value ? Because it is ' lived,' that is, because we love it and believe
in it? The alchemists had recipes for making gold, they loved them
and had faith in them, and yet our recipes are the good ones, although
our faith be less lively, because they succeed.

There is no escape from this dilemma; either science does not
enable us to foresee, and then it is valueless as rule of action ; or else
it enables us to foresee in a fashion more or less imperfect, and then
it is not without value as means of knowledge.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 445

It should not even be said that action is the goal of science;
should we condemn studies of the star Sirius, under pretext that we
shall probably never exercise any influence on that star? To my eyes,
on the contrary, it is the knowledge which is the end, and the action
which is the means. If I felicitate myself on the industrial develop-
ment, it is not alone because it furnishes a facile argument to the
advocates of science; it is above all because it gives to the scientist
faith in himself and also because it offers an immense field of experi-
ence where clash forces too colossal to be interfered with. Without
this ballast, who knows whether it would not quit the earth, seduced
by the mirage of some scholastic novelty, or whether it would not
despair, believing it had fashioned only a dream?

§ 3. The Crude Fact and the Scientific Fact

What was most paradoxical in M. LeKoy^s thesis was that affirma-
tion that the scientist creates the fact; this was at the same time its
essential point and it is one of those which have been most discussed.

Perhaps, says he (I well believe that this was a concession), it is
not the scientist that creates the fact in the rough; it is at least he
who creates the scientific fact.

This distinction between the fact in the rough and the scientific
fact does not by itself appear to me illegitimate. But I complain first
that the boundary has not been traced either exactly or precisely; and
then that the author has seemed to suppose that the crude fact, not
being scientific, is outside of science.

Finally, I can not admit that the scientist creates without restraint
the scientific fact since it is the crude fact which imposes it upon him.

The examples given by M. LeEoy have greatly astonished me. The
first is taken from the notion of atom. The atom chosen as example
of fact ! I avow that this choice has so disconcerted me that I prefer
to say nothing about it. I have evidently misunderstood the author's
thought and I could not fruitfully discuss it.

The second case taken as example is that of an eclipse where the
crude phenomenon is a play of light and shadow, but where the
astronomer can not intervene without introducing two foreign elements,
to wit, a clock and Newton's law.

Finally, M. LeEoy cites the rotation of the earth; it has been
answered: but this is not a fact, and he has replied: it was one for
Galileo, who affirmed it, as for the inquisitor, who denied it. It
always remains that this is not a fact in the same sense as those just
spoken of and that to give them the same name is to expose one's
self to many confusions.

Here then are four degrees:

1°. It grows dark, says the clown.

446 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

2°. The eclipse happened at nine o'clock, says the astronomer.

3°. The eclipse happened at the time deducible from the tables
constructed according to Newton's law, says he again.

4°. That results from the earth's turning around the sun, says
Galileo finally.

Where then is the boundary between the fact in the rough and the
scientific fact ? To read M. LeEoy one would believe that it is between
the first and the second stage, but who does not see that there is a
greater distance from the second to the third, and still more from the
third to the fourth.

Allow me to cite two examples which perhaps will enlighten us a
little.

I observe the deviation of a galvanometer by the aid of a movable
mirror which projects a luminous image or spot on a divided scale.
The crude fact is this: I see the spot displace itself on the scale, and
the scientific fact is this: a current passes in the circuit.

Or again: when I make an experiment I should subject the result
to certain corrections, because I know I must have made errors. These
errors are of two kinds, some are accidental and these I shall correct
by taking the mean; the others are systematic and I shall be able to
correct those only by a thorough study of their causes. The first result
obtained is then the fact in the rough, while the scientific fact is the
final result after the finished corrections.

Keflecting on this latter example, we are led to subdivide our
second stage, and in place of saying:

2. The eclipse happened at nine o'clock, we shall say :

2a. The eclipse happened when my clock pointed to nine, and

2&. My clock being ten minutes slow, the eclipse happened at ten
minutes past nine.

And this is not all: the first stage also should be subdivided, and
not between these two subdivisions will be the least distance; it is
necessary to distinguish between the impression of obscurity felt by
one witnessing an eclipse, and the affirmation; it grows dark, which
this impression extorts from him. In a sense it is the first which is the
only true fact in the rough, and the second is already a sort of
scientific fact.

Now then our scale has six stages, and even though there is no
reason for halting at this figure, there we shall stop.

What strikes me at the start is this. At the first of our six stages,
the fact, still completely in the rough, is, so to speak, individual, it is
completely distinct from all other possible facts. From the second
stage, already it is no longer the same. The enunciation of the fact
would suit an infinity of other facts. So soon as language intervenes,
I have at my command only a finite number of terms to express the

TEE VALUE OF SCIENCE 447

shades, in number infinite, that my impressions might cover. When I
say : It grows dark, that well expresses the impressions I feel in being
present at an eclipse; but even in obscurity a multitude of shades
could be imagined, and if, instead of that actually realized, had hap-
pened a slightly different shade, yet I should still have enunciated this
other fact by saying: It grows dark.

Second remark : even at the second stage, the enunciation of a fact
can only be true or false. This is not so of any proposition; if this
proposition is the enunciation of a convention, it can not be said that
this enunciation is true, in the proper sense of the word, since it could
not be true apart from me and is true only because I wish it to be.

When, for instance, I say the unit for length is the meter, this is
a decree that I promulgate, it is not something ascertained which
forces itself upon me. It is the same, as I think I have elsewhere
shown, when it is a question for example of Euclid's postulate.

When I am asked: Is it growing dark? I always know whether I
ought to reply yes or no. Although an infinity of possible facts may be
susceptible of this same enunciation: it grows dark, I shall always
know whether the fact realized belongs or does not belong among those
which answer to this enunciation. Facts are classed in categories, and
if I am asked whether the fact that I ascertain belongs or does not
belong in such a category, I shall not hesitate.

Doubtless this classification is sufficiently arbitrary to leave a large
part to man's freedom or caprice. In a word, this classification is a
convention. This convention being given, if I am asked: Is such a
fact true ? I shall always know what to answer, and my reply will be
imposed upon me by the witness of my senses.

If, therefore, during an eclipse, it is asked: Is it growing dark?
All the world will answer yes. Doubtless those speaking a language
where bright was called dark, and dark bright, would answer no. But
of what importance is that ?

In the same way, in mathematics, when I have laid down the
definitions, and the postulates which are conventions, a theorem hence-
forth can only be true or false. But to answer the question: Is this
theorem true? It is no longer to the witness of my senses that I
shall have recourse, but to reasoning.

A statement of fact is always verifiable, and for the verification we
have recourse either to the witness of our senses, or to the memory
of this witness. This is properly what characterizes a fact. If you
put the question to me : Is such a fact true ? I shall begin by asking
you, if there is occasion, to state precisely the conventions, by asking
you, in other words, what language you have spoken; then once
settled on this point, I shall interrogate my senses and shall answer
yes or no. But it will be my senses that will have made answer, it

448 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

will not be you when you say to me: I have spoken to you in English
or in French.

Is there something to change in all that when we pass to the
following stages ? When I observe a galvanometer, as I have just said,
if I ask an ignorant visitor: Is the current passing? He looks at the
wire to try to see something pass; but if I put the same question to
my assistant who understands my language, he will know I mean:
Does the spot move? and he will look at the scale.

What difference is there then between the statement of a fact in
the rough and the statement of a scientific fact? The same difference
as between the statement of the same crude fact in French and in
German. The scientific statement is the translation of the crude
statement into a language which is distinguished above all from the
common German or French, because it is spoken by a very much
smaller number of people.

Yet let us not go too fast. To measure a current I may use a very
great number of types of galvanometers or besides an electro dynamom-
eter. And then when I shall say there is running in this circuit
a current of so many amperes, that will mean: if I adapt to this
circuit such a galvanometer I shall see the spot come to the division a;
but that will mean equally: if I adapt to this circuit such an electro-
dynamometer, I shall see the spot go to the division o. And that will
mean still many other things, because the current can manifest itself
not only by mechanical effects, but by effects chemical, thermal,
luminous, etc.

Here then is one same statement which suits a very great number
of facts absolutely different. Why? It is because I assume a law
according to which, whenever such a mechanical effect shall happen,
such a chemical effect will happen also. Previous experiments, very
numerous, have never shown this law to fail, and then I have under-
stood that I could express by the same statement two facts so invari-
ablv bound one to the other.

When I am asked: Is the current passing? I can understand that
that means : Will such a mechanical effect happen ? But I can under-
stand also: Will such a chemical effect happen? I shall then verify
either the existence of the mechanical effect, or that of the chemical
effect; that will be indifferent, since in both cases the answer must be
the same.

And if the law should one day be found false? If it was per-
ceived that the concordance of the two effects, mechanical and chemical,
is not constant? That day it would be necessary to change the scien-
tific language to free it from a grave ambiguity.

And after that? Is it thought that ordinary language by aid of
which are expressed the facts of daily life is exempt from ambiguity?

TEE VALUE OF SCIENCE 449

Shall we thence conclude that the facts of daily life are the work
of the grammarians?

You ask me: Is there a current? I try whether the mechanical
effect exists, I ascertain it and I answer: Yes, there is a current. You
understand at once that that means that the mechanical effect exists,
and that the chemical effect, that I have not investigated, exists like-
wise. Imagine now, supposing an impossibility, the law we believe
true not to be, and the chemical effect not to exist. Under this
hypothesis there will be two distinct facts, the one directly observed
and which is true, the other inferred and which is false. It may
strictly be said that we have created the second. So that error is the
part of man's personal collaboration in the creation of the scientific fact.

But if we can say that the fact in question is false, is this not just
because it is not a free and arbitrary creation of our mind, a disguised
convention, in which case it would be neither true nor false. And in
fact it was verifiable; I had not made the verification, but I could have
made it. If I answered amiss, it was because I chose to reply too
quickly, without having asked nature, who alone knew the secret.

When, after an experiment, I correct the accidental and systematic
errors to bring out the scientific fact, the case is the same ; the scientific
fact will never be anything but the crude fact translated into another
language. When I shall say: It is such an hour, that will be a short
way of saying: There is such a relation between the hour indicated by
my clock, and the hour it marked at the moment of the passing of
such a star and such another star across the meridian. And this con-
vention of language once adopted, when I shall be asked: Is it such
an hour? it will not depend upon me to answer yes or no.

Let us pass to the stage before the last : the eclipse happened at the
hour given by the tables deduced from Newton's laws. This is still
a convention of language which is perfectly clear for those who know
celestial mechanics or simply for those who have the tables calculated
by the astronomers. I am asked: Did the eclipse happen at the hour
predicted? I look in the nautical almanac, I see that the eclipse was
announced for nine o'clock and I understand that the question means:
Did the eclipse happen at nine o'clock? There still we have nothing
to change in our conclusions. The scientific fact is only the crude
fact translated into a convenient language.

It is true that at the last stage things change. Does the earth
rotate? Is this a verifiable fact? Could Galileo and the Grand In-
quisitor, to settle the matter, appeal to the witness of their senses?
On the contrary, they were in accord about the appearances, and,
whatever had been the accumulated experiences, they would have re-
mained in accord with regard to the appearances without ever agreeing

vol. lxx. — 29

45o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

on their interpretation. It is just on that account that they were
obliged to have recourse to procedures of discussion so unscientific.

This is why I think they did not disagree about a fact: we have
not the right to give the same name to the rotation of the earth, which
was the object of their discussion, and to the facts crude or scientific
we have hitherto passed in review.

After what precedes, it seems superfluous to investigate whether the
fact in the rough is outside of science, because there can neither be
science without scientific fact, nor scientific fact without fact in the
rough, since- the first is only the translation of the second.

And then, has one the right to say that the scientist creates the
scientific fact? First of all, he does not create it from nothing, since
he makes it with the fact in the rough. Consequently he does not
make it freely and as he chooses. However able the worker may be, his
freedom is always limited by the properties of the raw material on
which he works.

After all, what do you mean when you speak of this free creation
of the scientific fact and when you take as example the astronomer
who intervenes actively in the phenomenon of the eclipse by bringing
his clock ? Do you mean : The eclipse happened at nine o'clock ; but if
the astronomer had wished it to happen at ten, that depended only on
him, he had only to advance his clock an hour?

But the astronomer, in perpetrating that bad joke, would evidently
have been guilty of an equivocation. When he tells me: The eclipse
happened at nine, I understand that nine is the hour deduced from
the crude indication of the pendulum by the usual series of correc-
tions. If he has given me solely that crude indication, or if he has
made corrections contrary to the habitual rules, he has changed the
language agreed upon without forewarning me. If, on the contrary,
he took care to forewarn me, I have nothing to complain of, but then
it is always the same fact expressed in another language.

In sum, all the scientist creates in a fact is the language in which
he enunciates it. If he predicts a fact, he will employ this language,
and for all those who can speak and understand it, his prediction is
free from ambiguity. Moreover, this prediction once made, it evi-
dently does not depend upon him whether it is fulfilled or not.

What then remains of M. LeEoy's thesis? This remains: the
scientist intervenes actively in choosing the facts worth observing.
An isolated fact has by itself no interest; it becomes interesting if one
has reason to think that it may aid in the prediction of other facts;
or better, if, having been predicted, its verification is the confirma-
tion of a law. Who shall choose the facts which, corresponding to
these conditions, are worthy the freedom of the city in science? This
is the free activity of the scientist.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 45 1

And that is not all. I have said that the scientific fact is the
translation of a crude fact into a certain language; I should add that
every scientific fact is formed of many crude facts. This is sufficiently
shown by the examples cited above. For instance, for the hour of the
eclipse my clock marked the hour a at the instant of the eclipse; it
marked the hour /? at the moment of the last transit of the meridian
of a certain star that we take as origin of right ascensions; it marked
the hour y at the moment of the preceding transit of this same star.
There are three distinct facts (still it will be noticed that each of them
results itself from two simultaneous facts in the rough; but let us
pass this over). In place of that I say: The eclipse happened at the
hour 24 (a-/?)/(/?— y), and the three facts are combined in a single
scientific fact. I have concluded that the three readings a, /?, y made
on my clock at three different moments lacked interest and that the
only thing interesting was the combination (a-/?)/(/?— y) of the three.
In this conclusion is found the free activity of my mind.

But I have thus used up my power; I can not make this com-
bination (a-(3) / (/3-^>) have such a value and not such another, since
I can not influence either the value of a, or that of /?, or that of y,
which are imposed upon me as crude facts.

In sum, facts are facts, and if it happens that they satisfy a pre-
diction, this is not an effect of our free activity. There is no precise
frontier between the fact in the rough and the scientific fact; it can
only be said that such an enunciation of fact is more crude or, on the
contrary, more scientific than such another.

(To be continued)

452 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

IS THE MIND IN THE BODY?

By Professor GEORGE STUART FULLERTON

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

A NUMBEE of years ago the eminent anatomist, Dr. Joseph Leidy,
-£-*- told me that a modern Maecenas had offered to pay for the
finest microscopes if he would undertake a search in brains for ideas.

The professor, who never pretended to be either a psychologist or
a philosopher, rejected the proposal on the ground that the investiga-
tion must be a profitless one. His common sense and common experi-
ence of mind and body led him to believe that mental phenomena are
not things to be captured as the result of such a method of attack.

But what induced him to take this stand? Common sense and
common experience, in some sense of the terms, men have always had
— at any rate, they have had what may be called by these names from
a very early period. And yet there was a time, and a very long time,
during which such an investigation would not have impressed men of
acuteness and learning as necessarily an absurd one.

There was a time during which, that is to say, men regarded minds
as something frankly and unequivocally material. Something elusive,
if you please; something too fine and subtle to be directly apparent to
the senses; but, nevertheless, something just as material as wood or
stone or flesh or bone, and just as really in this or that portion of
space.

Almost at the dawn of reflective thought we find men identifying
the mind with the breath which we inhale and exhale ; and when, later,
the time was ripe for the birth of an atomic theory, a crude and hasty
one, it is true, but the forerunner of the one which was to appear later,
we find them describing it as composed of atoms, which enter and
leave the body as do other kinds of matter.

About four hundred years before Christ, Democritus, who was a
man of scientific temper, even if of unavoidably limited scientific
attainment, placed before the world his atomistic doctrine. A hun-
dred years later that easy-going philosopher, Epicurus, adopted his
theory, and founded a long-lived school. In the first century, B. C,
the Eoman poet, Lucretius, wrote his magnificent poem e On Nature/
and set forth in noble verse the Epicurean doctrine touching the uni-
verse of things physical and mental.

The nature of the mind and soul, says Lucretius, is bodily; for when it is
seen to push the limbs, rouse the body from sleep, and alter the countenance

IS THE MIND IN THE BODY? 453

and guide and turn about the whole man, and when we see that none of these
effects can take place without touch nor touch without body, must we not admit
that the mind and soul are of a bodily nature?

But of what sort of bodies must we conceive this part of a man to
be composed? The mind acts with great nimbleness; it is very easily
moved, so it is inferred that it consists of bodies very small, smooth
and round :

The following fact, too, demonstrates how fine the texture is of which its
nature is composed, and how small the room is in which it can be contained,
could it only be collected into one mass: soon as the untroubled sleep of death
has gotten hold of a man and the nature of the mind and soul has withdrawn,
you can perceive then no diminution of the entire body either in appearance or
weight; death makes all good save the vital sense and heat. Therefore the
whole soul must consist of very small seeds and be inwoven through veins and
flesh and sinews; inasmuch as, after it has all withdrawn from the whole body,
the exterior contour of the limbs preserves itself entire and not a tittle of the
weight is lost.1

Lucretius thinks that something analogous takes place ' when the
flavor of a wine is gone, or when the delicious aroma of a perfume has
been dispersed into the air.' Something is gone, but the weight of
objects is not altered by the loss.

For hundreds of years it did not seem to men ridiculous to talk
about the mind in this way. Yet they all had the common experiences
of mental phenomena that we have. Nor was it the weakness of a
single school to be thus grossly materialistic. The Stoic school, the
great rival of the Epicurean, and also a long-lived one, was in its way
as materialistic. The Stoics identified the soul of man with the warm
breath that is found in his body.

Indeed, it is not too much to say that, among that very acute
people, the Greeks, from whom we have gained so much, it did not
seem at all unnatural to conceive of the mind of man as a breath, or
a fire, or collection of fine small material particles. Some raised their
voices in protest, but the protest was scarcely effectual.

Now, suppose someone had come to Lucretius and had initiated
him into the mysteries of the microscope. Would he have scouted the
idea of getting a direct vision of the ' seeds ' that constituted the mind
of man? I think not; there was certainly nothing in his doctrine to
make the idea absurd to him. If, in general, invisible material things
can be made visible, and the barrier set by their minuteness can be
done away, why should not coughed-out soul atoms be captured and
inspected ?

But Professor Leidy was amused at the notion of the investigation
proposed to him. Why was this? His experience of the mind was
no more direct or complete than that of Lucretius. He had never

1 ' De Rerum Natura,' III., trans. Munro.

454 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

given half as much thought to the nature of minds, for he was little
interested in psychology. Nevertheless, his common sense — whatever
that may be — led him to laugh at a way of looking at things that
could not have struck Lucretius and many other able men as absurd
at all.

It is extremely interesting to ask why the men of our day, I do
not mean the professional psychologists, but the great mass of intelli-
gent persons who do not care much for psychology, and who know
little of philosophy, should take up certain ways of regarding things
mental, and should unhesitatingly repudiate others which have once
been popular. We can not in the least explain it by saying that their
own experience of minds leads them to embrace such conclusions. As
a rule, they do not reflect upon their experiences of their minds at all,
and some of them are hardly capable of serious reflection upon the
subject. As early as the seventeenth century, John Locke remarked
that " the understanding, like the eye, whilst it makes us see and per-
ceive all other things, takes no notice of itself; and it requires art and
pains to set it at a distance, and make it its own object." To this
modern psychologists will heartily subscribe.

The fact is that the average man's notions about the mind are a
part of his share in the heritage of the race. He who knows some-
thing of the history of human thought finds in them the echoes of old
philosophies — traces of theories sometimes the most fantastic. The
common sense which guides men is the resultant attitude due to many
influences, some of them dating very far back indeed.

I have said that, even among the ancient Greeks, there were pro-
tests against the materialization of the mind. Both Plato and Aris-
totle stood out against it, each in his own way. It is true that Plato
distributes the soul through the body in a way that might strike an
Epicurean as not unnatural — a part of it was below the diaphragm,
a part of it in the chest, and a part of it in the head. But he does
speak of this last and noblest part in somewhat the same tone as that
in which men came later to speak of the human mind. Aristotle fol-
lows his teacher in regarding the reason, at least, as something to be
carefully distinguished from everything material. However, it is in-
teresting to note that he conceives of the divine reason, or first cause
of motion, as touching the world without being touched by it.

May we not describe this last notion as material at one end, so to
speak ? If reason is so immaterial that it can not be touched by mat-
ter, what does it mean to say that it touches matter? But we must
get used to queer ways of talking about minds, if we will follow the
history of human thought. The seed dropped by Plato and Aristotle
has grown into a tree when we come to Plotinus the Neo-Platonist,
who lived in the third century after Christ.

18 THE MIND IN THE BODY? 455

Plotinus was- a man of mystical tendencies, but he was both learned
and acute. He insists that the soul is an immaterial substance, and
he tries to give us a notion of the way in which such a thing can be
related to the body. To put it into the body, as Epicurus or Lucretius
did, would be to deny its immateriality. This he can not do. To
deny that it is related to the body at all is too much even for a
philosopher.

In his perplexity he follows a middle course. He tells us that the
soul is not in space and is not in things, in the strict sense. But in
a certain sense it is in things, or is present to things. It is as a whole
in the whole body, and is at the same time wholly in every part of
the body; and is, thus, at once divisible and indivisible.

One may legitimately object to this curious doctrine, and criticize
Plotinus as giving with one hand what he takes away with the other.
It is easy to see what he tried to do, and what he actually did do. He
tried to draw a clear distinction between mental phenomena and phys-
ical, and to tell us how they are related. He succeeded only in making
of the soul an inconsistently material thing, existing in space in an
inconceivable way.

But it will not do to treat Plotinus with contempt, and to pass over
his doctrine as insignificant. He made an earnest attempt to draw a
line between the mental and the physical — surely some such line ought
to be drawn — and his influence upon men's minds has been enormous.
His doctrine was taken up by Augustine, from whom it passed to the
philosophers of the middle ages; and it came ultimately, after under-
going various modifications, to the modern philosophers. Distinct
traces of it are to be found in some of the psychologies written at the
present day and used in our colleges.

In the seventeenth century that remarkable man Descartes arrived
at a fairly clear comprehension of the mechanism of the human body,
and of the significance in it of the brain and the nerves. He con-
cluded that the soul or mind has its ' chief seat ' in the pineal gland
in the brain, and that messages are carried to it from the various parts
of the body. Yet he never ventured to put the soul quite frankly and
unequivocally in the pineal gland. He still held that the soul was
united to all the parts of the body ' conjointly ' — the old Plotinic
notion.

In other words, he did not go back to Lucretius, and he did not go
forward to a clear distinction between mind and body. He remained
halting in indecision; he left a dark place for his successors to illu-
minate with such light as they could furnish. They have been at the
work ever since, and have had varying degrees of success.

Now the speculations of the philosophers, especially when they
touch upon those things which are supposed to be of great moment to

456 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

mankind, do not remain the property of the philosophers. They ooze
out into general literature and become, so to speak, the common prop-
erty of mankind. In the present instance, we find in the attitude of
the majority of the cultivated persons who surround us to-day unmis-
takable traces both of the crude materialism which seems so natural
to man when he first begins to think about the mind, and of the line
of speculation indicated above. Men think of the mind as somehow
in the body, in the brain; and yet they are not willing to admit that
it is unequivocally in the body — in it as brain cells are, as blood cor-
puscles are, as are any of the material constituents of the body itself.

Ask the average undergraduate student — who can not be accused
of having done much thinking for himself, but who holds the vague
opinions that he has absorbed from those about him — ask him where
his mind is, and he will probably answer that it is in his brain. Ask
him, further, whether there is any hope of getting at it as one may
hope to get at the material constituents of the brain, and I think he
will say, No ! It is there, and yet not exactly there; it is there in a
Pickwickian sense. He feels as Dr. Leidy did, and his feeling has
exactly the same foundation. It rests upon an ancient tradition.

What, then, is the relation of mind and brain? We seem to be
left with an 'in' on our hands that is not really an in at all, but is
something else. What is it? Our student can not tell us, nor can
those from whom he has picked up his vague and inconsistent notions.

To those who wish to think clearly all this is naturally unsatisfac-
tory. Those who busy themselves with the problem "are impelled to
try to make the matter less vague. Now and then, even in our time,
men go back, to accomplish this end, to something very like the ancient
materialism which the world outgrew so long ago.

Thus we now and then hear it maintained that thought is a secre-
tion of the brain. Half a century ago much was said about this, and
to many the doctrine seemed plausible. It certainly does appear to
make clearer the relation of mind and body, if we hold that mental
phenomena are related to the brain as the saliva is related to the sali-
vary gland. If we can say this, we may maintain that the mind is in
the body in a literal and unambiguous sense of the word.

But may we legitimately speak thus? The secretion of a gland is
a something so unequivocally material that it can be treated just like
other material things. It can be collected into a test-tube and ana-
lyzed by the chemist. Has any one ever succeeded in filling a test-
tube with mental phenomena? in bottling and analyzing in a labora-
tory pains and pleasures, memories and anticipations ? Dr. Leidy, who
knew a vast amount about the secretions of glands, did not confound
ideas with secretions, and would not even attempt to treat them in the
same way.

IS THE MIND IN THE BODY? 457

It is, indeed, too late in the world's history to try to revive the
crude materialism of the past. Whatever else the philosophers have
done, they have fixed our attention upon the striking distinction be-
tween mental phenomena and physical. He who has once grasped this
may be a semi-materialist — an unconscious materialist — as is the plain
man to-day, notwithstanding his assertion that the mind is immaterial ;
and as is his more learned neighbor the ' interactionist ' psychologist,
of whom I spoke in a recent paper in this journal.2 But he can
scarcely be a materialist out-and-out.

Hence, men have felt impelled to turn to other ways of making
clear the relation of mind and body. Some have said that conscious-
ness is a function of the brain; some, that it is the inside of that
which, regarded from the outside, is brain-change; some, that it is the
reality to which physical phenomena may be referred as appearance.

It is not well to let any one of these statements pass without
scrutiny. What do we mean when we say that the mind is a func-
tion of the brain? Do we mean only that, given certain changes
in the brain, certain mental phenomena come into being? It still
remains to ask how the mental phenomena are related to the brain.
Are they in there? and if not, where are they? or are they anywhere,
in any intelligible sense of the word? The word ' function' is not
a word to conjure with. We may call motion a function of brain
molecules, if we choose; but evidently a memory or a feeling of pain
is not a function of this kind, and the question still confronts us:
What kind of a function is it?

As to the statement that mental phenomena may be regarded as
the inside of that which, looked at from the outside, is brain-change —
this we may take as merely 'a manner of speech,' as a something to
say to troublesome persons who ask us difficult questions and must
be answered at all hazards. When we say that seeds are inside of
an orange, we know what we mean. They are things that occupy space,
and can be found in the spaces that they occupy. A leather purse
may be lined with silk, and it may contain silver; but try to line
a leather purse with painful emotions, and to fill it with hopes and
expectations! We play with the words ' inside' and 'outside' when
we talk in this way, and it is not proper to play when one is philoso-
phizing, some learned men to the contrary notwithstanding.

Nor should the words 'appearance' and 'reality' be abused reck-
lessly. They have a proper meaning, and we ought to keep to it. We
say that a tree seen at a distance looks small, but really is large; and
we say that a stick stuck into water looks crooked, but really is straight.
Certain experiences we look upon as appearances, and certain others,
which for some reason we regard as more satisfactory or more normal,

'Popuxab Science Monthly, February, 1907.

45 8 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

we speak of as realities. Both appearance and reality are given in
sensation, and we observe a connection between them. They belong
to the same order of experiences.

Thus, I may sit in the highest gallery of the opera house, and may
say : What looks like a row of small shiny discs in the parquet is really
a row of bald heads. Be it remarked that the reality in this case is
a something that can unequivocally be located; it is in the parquet,
and it occupies space. It can be seen close at hand, and it can be
touched with the fingers. May I say that what seems to be a, brain-
change in one of these heads really is a sensation of sound? Is the
sensation of sound there? does it occupy space? is it literally in the
head?

Evidently we are here again concerned only with 'a, manner of
speech' — with a loose expression which cloaks one's ignorance, and
which borrows what force it has from a false analogy. If we say
that the sensation of sound is the 'reality' and the brain-change the
' appearance,' we abuse two respectable words, in common use, that
nave a right to better treatment.

The truth is that it is better to recognize that mental phenomena
must not be conceived after the analogy of material things at all.
We may, of course, go on talking about mind and body as other
people do. In common life a pedantic exactitude of expression is
out of place. But when we try to be scientific we must strip off
crude inherited materialisms, the echoes of a remote past.

The man who has done this the most completely is the parallelist.
The limits of this paper prevent me from setting forth his doctrine,
but I have elsewhere3 tried to show simply and clearly just how
much he has a right to mean by it. He denies frankly that the mind
is in the body, as also that one has the right to hint, by the use of
vague and ambiguous material analogies, that it is somehow in the
body. It was a philosopher of the seventeenth century who first
thought out the doctrine, but it was a scientist of the nineteenth
century, Professor W. K. Clifford, who made it popular to us moderns.
To him much of the credit for the present revival of the doctrine
must be accorded.

s'An Introduction to Philosophy,' N. Y., 1906, chapter IX.

DRUG ABUSES 459

DRUG ABUSES, THEIR EFFECTS ON THE PEOPLE

By J. MADISON TAYLOR, A.B., M.D.

PHILADELPHIA, PA.

r^VRUG abuses have become so grave that at last the medical pro-
•*S fession is compelled to correct them. The public should learn
clearly our mutual positions in the proper and improper use of drugs,
which are chemical substances found useful or necessary to combat
the effects of disease. They are demanded in many instances where
no other known means are available. It is obvious, however, that
misuse is capable of vastly greater harm than their absence.

Certain ' schools of medicine ' are recognized, differing chiefly in
the opinions entertained as to what drugs shall be employed and
what effects are to be expected from them, as well as the manner of
their administration. The e schools ' most prominent are two ; the
regular profession of medicine and that of homeopathy. Though start-
ing from the same basis, i. e., long experience in the selection and
preparation of remedial substances, begun in the earliest periods of
history, a time came when revolt arose from the existing confusion.
Hahneman, a vigorous dogmatic thinker, determined to change the
point of view hitherto entertained, and in the process accomplished a
number of important results. The chief of these was in the prepara-
tion of drugs, and in the amounts administered. He evolved a num-
ber of opinions and many shrewd conjectures, some fanciful and
some based on careful observation, as to drug effects, direct and in-
direct. To-day, after a century of critical scrutinization of recorded
principles, these two schools differ on essential points inconsiderably.
The vital point is that drugs in one form or another are popularly
believed to be endowed with enormous powers for good. History
encourages this belief, especially when one considers the discovery of
cinchona and certain specifics, such as mercury, and later the anti-
toxins. The utility of drugs, remedial substances foreign to the
economy, is of the highest order in many forms of disease. In the
future when the principles of their action are fully understood, both
from experience and physiology, they will continue to exert even more
definite usefulness. Some hygienic and other measures are capable of
replacing them, many of supplementing them, but in certain grave
emergencies they are absolutely required. To omit their use, and
expect to discharge full duty to the sick, is a failure to furnish some-
thing essential, permitting a person endangered by the tyranny of

460 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

disease to suffer neglect. It is conceivable that in the future an ade-
quate growth in knowledge of the inherent resources of the organism
may lead to their omission; but that day is not yet come.

Wherever there is demand it is met by supply. An overmastering
desire of most people is to secure the largest material benefits for the
least money. Where a physician is consulted and medicines are
ordered, these must be paid for in addition to the fee for advice, hence
all manner of devices are employed to reduce the cost. The fact is
too often overlooked that only by the direct application of skilled advice
to the instance, then a suitable remedy being chosen, is safety to be
secured. The business man might otherwise as well depend on law
primers and omit to consult skilled attorneys. The unwarrantable
repetition of prescriptions emanating from physicians of admitted wis-
dom, and the recommending of these to friends and neighbors gratu-
itously, are obvious abuses of what is essentially an economically scien-
tific procedure.

As commercial enterprises grew in complexity and breadth of scope,
these ' favorite prescriptions ' began to be manufactured, advertised and
distributed in wholesale fashion. People were encouraged to believe
that they might thus secure medical combinations of great power at
first hand, and the apparent but false economy was broadly welcomed.
These preparations were made agreeable, or at least acceptable, and any
one could secure a bottle full of promising potentialities guaranteed to
overcome whatsoever ills might occur, real or fancied. Hence arose
two classes of drug combination, the nostrum, offered directly to the
consumer, based on the commercial principle of exploiting ' favorite
prescriptions,' and the proprietary preparations offered to the phy-
sician, purporting to be improvements, the product of laboratory
researches, constituting true chemical discoveries or refinements and
specializations in scientific manufacture. As to the former (the
nostrum), it is impossible to see, viewed with the utmost charity, any
reason for its existence. Of many of the proprietary preparations, it
must be admitted that they evidence excellent advances made by the
reputable drug manufacturers, who devote much money and scientific
effort to the perfection of methods and products. They have, in many
instances, however, transgressed their just prerogatives and invaded
the territory of the physician. They make diagnoses, teach us pathol-
ogy and instruct us how to prescribe.

The sales of nostrums have grown so large as to constitute an
overwhelming proportion of all medicines consumed. Their unguided
use induces drug habits, fetish worship, incalculable harm.

The educated experienced practitioner of medicine has been forced
by the reckless drug consumption thus induced to take not only a
secondary position, but is placed low in the scale of guiding influence,

DRUG ABUSES 461

in legitimate rewards. The sphere of the physician is of largest prac-
tical utility to the community. He it is who, by long years of close
study, hospital teaching and personal experience, becomes gradually
equipped to fill the responsible post of conservator of public and
private health, of guide to the delicate human mechanism when dis-
ordered. His problem is a complex one for which he must furnish
the highest qualities of character, wisdom, tact, sympathy and personal
kindliness. He is the one who, even in those situations of gravity
when the onslaughts of disease can not be stayed, comes closer to the
heart, the soul and person than even the man of God. He should be
(and in this as in other ways he seldom fails) in all respects a man,
typifying the most estimable advisory qualities of friend, father,
brother. No household is safe without a wise family physician in
whom the members can repose confidence. He can, and does, furnish
far more than medical advice; he is the counselor in a thousand direc-
tions, whether in illness, sorrow, domestic catastrophe, mental shock,
perils of countless sorts and degrees. He can only display his resource-
fulness, his manifold capacities, if he be permitted free access to the
household to enable him to foresee, warn and thus prevent those calami-
ties which too often can not be cured. It is an inconsiderable part of
his duties to administer drugs, though these are among his keenest
weapons. He should possess the fullest knowledge of their uses and
employ them with skill and timeliness.

How far could a crew of bankers, of clergymen, of merchants guide
and use a man-of-war? What sort of pictures could a man untrained
in pictorial art paint, were he provided with the full accoutrements of
a skilled artist? How long would a child alone continue to live in a
butcher shop stocked full for Christmas feasting ? These analogues are
mild compared with that of an ailing man or woman turned loose in
a chemist's shop to select remedies unaided. Yet many people take
advice and swallow drugs, deadly in ultimate intent, incited thereto
by each other, by the newspapers, by alluring labels on the bottles,
and still regard themselves as shrewd. They often do worse, if, fail-
ing good effects from these nostrums (and provided they survive)
turning to charlatans, who trade upon human credulity, themselves
not realizing that sick bodies always enshrine disordered minds.

The sphere of the physician is not that of a merchant selling wares ;
he is the scientific and practical guide in times of physical danger.
His duties and responsibilities are theoretically, but not practically,
understood. The public expects of him who guides the helm in times
of disease and threatened death ethical qualities which he seldom fails
to furnish. If in his best judgment drugs are needed, he it is who
should select and change. He may be less wise than he might, or
even than he is estimated, but assuredly he is vastly better fitted at all

462 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

times to direct and control the course of physical derangements than
even the wisest layman.

Commercial principles are comprehensible by all; financial success
is obtrusively tangible. A firm earning enormous sums by the sale of
remedies is naturally supposed to be offering a valuable product. The
professional spirit, the ethical, the scientific principles on which action
must be based to be intelligently successful, are thus obscured. The
great proportion of people of this country estimate the scientific prac-
titioners of medicine, equipped as they are with years of patient
scientific self-sacrificing education, as of small account compared with
the material achievements of the great factors of nostrums and pro-
prietary medicines. The sphere of acquired wealth, in comparison with
this quiet faithful service, is obvious, speaks a comprehensible language.

The members of our profession in the concrete have quietly sub-
mitted to a domination at the hands of these manufacturers which is
no less than contemptible. In matters of politics ' money talks/ The
great power of the country resides in the public press. With them
money also talks. Advertisements are paid for which alone aggregate
sums close to the total of the gross earnings of legitimate practitioners.
Hence naturally are induced alliances, defensive and offensive, whereby
the power of the great drug houses becomes increasingly intrenched for
good or evil.

The members of a learned profession are thus made to appear of
little account. When they protest, as individuals, their voice is over-
borne by platoon fires of pseudo-scientific, advertising jargon till most
of us become dazed and all but ready to capitulate before we can place
our evidence on record, or even get a hearing.

Incredible sums of money are spent by the great drug manufac-
turing houses to make and hold their power. They are almost im-
pregnable, but not quite. No physician in America earns such an
income as is enjoyed by many individual members of these firms who
live like royal princes, leaving at death fortunes which, when subdi-
vided, suffice for generations of affluence. Yet the cure of all this
peril is simple, but by no means easy of attainment. Physicians should
act in concert and consistently. They should acquaint themselves ac-
curately with the facts and educate the public to know where and
how drugs may be best used, and especially point out where they
should not.

First let us, every one, learn and make clear to the public at all
times what are the effects of nostrums. Can they exercise any bene-
ficent purpose? Emphatically no. What good end can they serve?
It is difficult to see one. What possible advantage can accrue from
this obtrusion of drugs in attractive shapes upon the receptive con-
sciousness of the community? It may be claimed that every man has

DRUG ABUSES 463

the right to make free choice of the treatment for his bodily ailments.
Yet the practise of self-medication is one of the most deplorable relics
of the dark ages when the treatment of bodily ailments was confused
with matters of conscience.

Consider for a moment the gravity of a peril for which it is difficult
to see a remedy. These aggregations of capital must sell to maintain
themselves. If the market is oversupplied they must make another
market. If physicians do not wish to use such preparations as they
furnish, they must be induced to do so, their hands must be forced.
If the manufacturer sells directly to the public, via the druggist, every
device must be employed to increase retailing to the consumer. If a
man has no ailment he must be taught to think he has one. If he
has recovered from an ailment he must forsooth thereupon be made
fat or thin. Women are educated to believe they require a host of
remedial articles, in reality quite supererogatory. Babies who would
thrive best by instinctive maternal teachings are made to appear in need
of special foods, soothing agents, etc. In short, healthy folk are
taught to become hypochondriacs. All this merely to furnish a brisk
market when selling has grown languid.

One closing thought we commend to all, especially to clergymen
and religious folk. Can anything be more venal, more opposed to the
fundamental principles of ethics, more an earning of money by en-
couraging misconceptions of our physical and mental feebleness, than
many of the ordinary advertisements in the public press of remedies,
of drugs, or other semi-medical materials, waters, instruments, etc.?
If these bold emphatic advertising statements contain some elements of
truth they are too often grossly overstated. The sale of t get well
quick ' remedies for venereal diseases causes a confidence unwarranted.
Thus thousands of innocent women are infected, rendered invalids
for life.

There is only one safe rule when in trouble. Seek expert, honest,
reputable counsel and be guided by it. This is of paramount im-
portance when the body is disordered because then also is the mind,
the judgment, likewise impaired. .

464 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ILLUSIONS OF VISION AND THE CANALS OP MAES

By Professor ANDREW ELLICOTT DOUGLASS

UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA.

rpHAT fascinating mystery, the planet Mars, will again approach
-*- the earth this summer. Again the nightly watcher will note
the diminishing snow caps at the poles, the dark areas of vegetation,
enlarging with the welcome moisture, and, perchance a cloud or two
that, lingering over the cold Martian night, is dissipated in the sun-
rise heat, revealing thus its character.

Again also will hundreds of fine dark lines appear, which from
their straightness and artificial appearance, seem to attest the exist-
ence of highly intelligent beings upon our neighbor.

It is right and natural that we should first regard these faintest
of markings as realities upon the planet. The writer can certify to
their apparent genuineness, for he has pictured numbers of them in
half a dozen favorable oppositions since 1892. To him they were real
until time proved that in the faintest markings astronomers failed of
satisfactory agreement. In the larger markings, and even in the larger
canals, conflicts of evidence do occur, but are never troublesome. One
may confidently say that such realities do exist. But with the very
faint canals whose numbers reach occasionally well into the hundreds,
discordance reigns supreme, and it is frequently found that different
drawings by the same artist antagonize each other across the page.

Considerations along these lines led the writer to study seriously
the origin of these inconsistent faint canals by the methods of experi-
mental psychology, and the application of those methods has resulted
in a new optical illusion and new adaptations of old and well-known
phenomena, all of which apply profoundly to the case in hand. Their
description and application follow.

Halo

The most important of these phenomena is the halo.

To observe this, place Fig. 1 at a distance of six to eight feet from
the eye and look at it from time to time, taking care to avoid fatigue.
Around it will appear a whitish area limited externally by a faint
dark line forming a perfect circle, as if traced by a pair of compasses.
This external ring or secondary image has a sensible width and appears
blackest on its sharp inner edge. When once caught, which is usually

ILLUSIONS OF VISION 465

at the first view, it is a striking phenomenon. I find on the whole
that trained eyes are the ones which see it most quickly.

A more beautiful and elegant way of making the experiment is by
standing a black-headed hat pin in the middle of a white-walled room,
and looking at it against the distant white background. Around the
head of the pin will then appear
this halo, more beautiful than
before, suspended in mid-air, in
the good old-fashioned manner of
saintly halos.

The experiment described above _

gives the ' negative ' halo. It will
be generally referred to in this
article, because it is more easily
seen than the ' positive/ The
( positive ' form of the halo, how-
ever, is most readily seen by a

■ •!„_ 4.i,„i t i -L-4. Fig. 1. This Spot should be viewed

similar method. Let a white- _. „ ^„ „ „„„ „

from a Distance of Six or Eight Feet,

headed pin be Substituted for the with care to avoid fatigue or after-images, in

■ i t i i i i • oider to see the fine dark halo ring about it

Other, and looked at against a at the distance indicated by the smaller dot.

black background. Similarly, a

white circle is seen. The difficulties in this case arise from the
reflections on the head of the pin and its generally less even illu-
mination.

The effect, however, is the same. Extending all round the head
of the pin at a distance of about 7' of arc (one inch at a distance of
500 inches) is an intensified zone in which the color of the background
appears stronger; and outside of that a reduction zone, or ring, or
secondary image, in which the intensity of the background is reduced
by the addition of some of the color of the spot observed.

In order to find the cause of this halo, many tests were made, of
which the first was upon the size of the central spot, It was found
that the distance from the edge of the spot to the secondary image is
constant; that the width of the secondary image increases to some
extent with the size of the spot, and that the intensified area increases
its intensification with the size of the spot. If the spot is so small
as to be barely visible, the halo may still be seen, but the intensified
zone then appears of the same intensity as the background.

If the spot is enlarged sufficiently, both positive and negative halos
are seen along its margin, one outside and one inside, so that in a
straight line separating light and dark areas, the positive halo may
be seen in the dark area, and the negative halo in the light. If two
small spots are placed so that their halos intersect, the halo of each

VOL. lxx. — 30

466

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

may usually be seen complete. If the spots are larger, the halos can
not be traced within each other's precincts, and on enlarging the spots
still more, they soon act as one mark with regard to the halo, which
assumes an elliptical form around them. From these and other ex-
periments along the same line, it appears that the intensified zone or
white area, as I shall generally call it, referring to the negative experi-
ment, displays an increased sensitiveness to presence or absence of
color of the spot looked at, but a decided deadening in the perception
of details.

My first idea in regard to this halo was that it came to life like
the camera ghost, from reflections between lens surfaces in the eye,
but I found that it could be produced through any portion of the
crystalline lens. A pin hole 1/50 inch in diameter passed before the
pupil of the eye demonstrated this.

It then seemed possible that some form of halation in the mem-
branes close to the retina might produce this effect. The common

photographic halation ring, which
closely resembles it, is produced by
reflection from the back of a glass
plate but can only occur under cer-
tain conditions. This halo, how-
ever, occurs on all margins and
can not be due to that cause.

At this stage, a certain ' chro-
matic ring,' described below under
that heading, was observed, and
suggested some obscure color con-
ditions as the cause. Hence, color
tests were made in large numbers,
and the black spot was tried on dif-
ferent colored backgrounds with-
out effect. Different colored spots
against a dark background were
also observed without effect, save that the secondary image when suffi-
ciently bright was seen to be of the color of the spot itself; therefore
color was not responsible for the halo.

But these color observations opened up a very interesting line of
study. The color tests had to be made in the positive form with all
the attendant difficulties of fatigue and after-images. It was found
that a short gaze at a red disk on a black background, followed by a
slight movement of the eye to one side, carried away a dark green
after-image of the disk surrounded by a red margin, about the size of
the intensified zone. This intensified zone became still more con-

Fig. 2. Photographic Halation Ring
about Candle Flame, formed by reflection
inside the glass plate on which the picture
was taken, very similar in its appearance to
the halo here described.

ILLUSIONS OF VISION

467

spicuous by longer fixation of the gaze upon the colored spot, To
observe this, half-inch disks of red, yellow, green and blue paper were
pasted vertically on ends of long needles and placed in strong lamp-
light at a distance of eight feet from the eye. After long unwinking
gaze at one of these disks, until general color sensitiveness seemed to
be disappearing and the color of the disk itself seemed to be spread-
ing out around it, a quick closing of the eye, or the mere placing of
a sheet of paper close before the open eyes, revealed a very interesting
succession of changes, as follows:

1. A black or dark green disk with a limited red margin filling the
intensified zone, limited by the dark halo. This effect lasted for a
very brief instant of time, like the common positive after-image.

ggtej

Fig. 3. 'Dot' Mote outside the
\ello\v Spot.

Fig. 4. 'Dot' Mote in Yellow Spot
but not in Fovea.

2. The outline soon reappeared; the red disk and all white objects
taking a dark indigo-blue color, the remainder of the field being a
bright yellow. This effect might last a minute or two.

3. During the height of this effect a negative halo appeared for a
time around the dark after-image of the disk at the usual distance of
7'. The success of this experiment depends largely upon steadiness of
vision and avoidance of winking. The determination of the effect of
different colors and conditions offers a fine field for investigation.

The next test with a view to locating the cause of this halo phe-
nomenon was made on motes that so often float by the line of vision.
This was done by looking at a highly-illuminated area through a small
pin hole held close to the eye. Three classes of motes were observed:
First, the usual cell fragments and groups; second, rapidly moving
objects probably of similar character, and, thirdly, minute black dots
which from their motions seemed to be located in the same region as

46S

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the first, probably not far in front of the retina. On this last class,
some beautiful halo phenomena were observed.

When one of these spots was outside a region identified as approxi-
mately the yellow spot, it appeared as a circular dark area of some 30'
diameter as shown in Fig. 3. When it came within the yellow spot, it
became lighter, and was surrounded by the halo, with its intensified
zone and secondary image well defined as in Fig. 4. When, however,
it came within the region of most distinct vision, which was very rare,
it gave the most beautiful halo effect I have yet seen. It had a dense,
black spot in its very center, usually well rayed; then, a light zone
limited by an intense black ring, which in turn produced its own com-
plete halo. This form is shown in Fig.. 5.

Fig. 5. 'Dot' Mote in Fovea.

Fig. 6. Same as Figures 5, viewed at
Close Range. Notice different length of
rays compared to diameter of ring.

This mote observation is by no means easy. I have often waited
fifteen minutes for a mote of this type to appear, and only once have
I kept one in sight for any length of time. It then remained in the
center of vision for at least twenty minutes. Usually, they float past
the center of the vision and give one only a brief view. The size of
pin hole used is 1/50 inch. With a much larger hole, say 1/20 inch,
they become blurred. By getting near a large lamp shade so that a
wide angle of light is viewed, they are best discovered. Then one may
retreat from the light and view them as illustrated in Figs. 3, -1 and 5.

The rays observed in the central spot are very interesting. Their
length offers a means of measuring the height of the spot above the
retina. A short calculation upon approximate data results in 0.002
inch as the distance of the spot from the retina.

It is true that these mote observations require great patience, but

ILLUSIONS OF VISION 469

the beauty of the phenomena repays the effort. There is a sharpness
and a density about the inner halo around the spot itself which does
not characterize the ordinary outer halo. For such differences I have
no explanation to offer.

Not only is the cause of these details very difficult of detection,
but the origin of the whole halo phenomenon is equally so. It prob-
ably lies in the obscure reactions that change light waves into nerve
impulses. One thing which the intensified zone does do is to help
correct for rays which the irregular refraction of the eye scatters across
a margin ; and so this light area fulfils some psychological necessity.

The fact that in the first flash of after-images this zone becomes
occupied by the color of the object looked at (like the common positive
after-image) suggests that it is a zone in a condition of expectant
attention with reference to that color. If, for example, a red disk
is observed, the nerves that per-
ceive that color are in full ac-
tivity, where the stimulus of the
image f^lls on the retina. For
a certain distance away from the
active retina, they are aroused into
a condition of readiness for ac-
tivity or expectant attention. The
secondary image acts like the fa-
tigue area, for it reverses in the
after-image.

The siofnificance and applica- _ D

& J- J- Fig. 7. Stellar Rays.

tion of the phenomena are easier.

From the psychological standpoint, its immediate application is to
questions of contrast. Contrasts are divided into two classes: First,
successive contrast, due to fatigue and rest ; second, simultaneous or
marginal contrast, now seen to be a subordinate part of this halo
phenomena. Marginal contrast has been long known, and its after-
image, the ' Lichthof ' of Hering, has been described. The fact that the
halo phenomenon definitely limits the region of marginal contrast and
displays a secondary image in a definite position proves it to be the
more fundamental phenomenon. We have here, therefore, a new illu-
sion of interest to psychologists and of great significance in its appli-
cation to astronomical work.

Eats

Unlike the halo, the ray phenomena are familiar and involve no
new principle, but the idea of rays around a black spot is new to me,
and quite as important as the halo in its application to visual work
by telescope or microscope. As all know, the rays on a star are pro-

47°

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

duced by irregular refraction in the eye, originating in what are known
as the stellate figures. The figures seem to be construction lines, as
it were, in the crystalline lens, and develop during its growth. They
are permanent in form, when adult years are reached, and may be

Fig. 8. Structure Lines in Crystalline Lens.

seen with ease by the methods commonly explained in books upon
experimental psychology.

If white rays may be seen around a white star on a dark back-
ground, then black rays must be visible around a black spot on a
white background. They may be easily seen by screening the greater
part of the pupil and allowing light from a black spot to pass through

its margin. This is best done by a small circular
screen on the point of a needle. By slight per-
severance all the principal rays seen on a star
may be perceived on the black spot. These are
always present in the eye, but are not com-
monly perceived, because they are drowned out
in the lighter background, and habit compels
us to disregard them. Their importance in
astronomical work is at once evident when I state
that with the head in a definite position, I found it easier to see cer-
tain lines on the planet Mars and those easier lines coincided in direc-
tion with the two black rays represented in Fig. 9. It is evident that
observations made with the greatest possible care ought to show these
canals like marks, and if two of these rays be parallel, as may easily
happen in an astigmatic eye, some of the canals should appear double.

Fig. 9. Rays on a
Black Spot obtained by
screening all the Pupil
except the margin of
the (left) Side. These
rays are the two long rays
on the left in Fig. 7.

ILLUSIONS OF VISION 47 1

Irradiation. — Next to the black rays in importance is the matter
of irradiation as analyzed by means of ray forms. The method of
investigation is as follows: Make a small hole in a window blind and
observe the sky through it by different distances. From near-by
the outline of the hole is well perceived, but, as one draws away, the
rays soon obscure the hole itself, so that its form and size can not be
perceived. At these different distances, the width of the rays varies
with the true angular size of the hole. For example, I found at ten
feet an irradiation of 2' and at three feet an irradiation of 6', because
at the nearer point the rays are three times as wide and overlap each
other at three times the distance from the hole. Irradiation then is
the merging together of the rays, and on any straight line of separa-
tion, is proportional to the total ray light on the corresponding hemi-
sphere about a star.

Color, size, intensity and perfection of eye are positive factors in
irradiation. The negative factor is the background, and the result
depends upon the sensitiveness of the eye at the time of observation.
Some general results we can see at once. Irradiation is not neces-
sarily the same in any two eyes or in any two directions. It varies
with fatigue of the retina and probably with use of the eye in some
unusual position, producing unusual conditions of pressure upon the
eye-ball. Ordinarily, its amount depends directly on contrast between
the areas observed and on the size of the central nucleus of rays in
the desired direction. This nucleus must not be assumed to be cen-
trally located on its source.

Best Part of Lens. — A very important bit of information derived
in this study of the rays is the location and size of the best part of
the crystalline lens. This is done by trying smaller and smaller dia-
phragms over the eye until the rays cease to appear. They will be
found to persist in rudimentary form even when the diaphragm is
as small as 1/16 of an inch. This is of great significance in tele-
scopic and microscopic work, because it shows how small the emergent
pencil of light must be to avoid the excessive formation of rays. Even
at best, they can not be hindered entirely. The use of lower powers
with large emergent pencil is therefore very dangerous. The optically
superior part of the lens occupies a small irregular area near the center
with irregular extensions out toward the margin. Even the best part
is far from perfect.

Detached Spots. — An interesting variation of stellar rays has been
observed at least in one case. A gentleman drew for me the rays as
they appeared to his eye in the experiment described above (see Fig.
7), and while working asked me if I had placed a number of smaller
pin holes around the large one. Fig. 10 represents this. It is per-
fectly possible for detached spots of this kind to be produced by some

472 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

irregularity of the lens structure and thus to supply illusive satellites
to planets or fictitious companions to double stars.

Chromatic Kings

The illusive chromatic rings which follow do not bear so much on
questions of Martian topography as the preceding halo and rays. Yet
they are interesting of themselves and have an influence on color
estimations. The first is the broad prismatic ring which extends from

about 31/2 ° to 5° from the
source of light with red on
the outside and green or blue
on the inside. This shows well
on any brilliant light such as
the full moon or a bright elec-
tric light.

The second is a narrow
blue ring, of interest on ac-
count of its beauty. It is best
seen on an electric arc light of
intense blue color — and the less
continuous spectrum the light
shows, the better. Standing at

fig. 10. rays and detached spots. a distance of one hundred and

fifty or two hundred feet, one
may see a beautiful narrow blue line forming a circle fully two feet
in diameter about the light. As the color of the light changes to
yellow, which it frequently does, the ring rapidly disappears into the
center of. the light.

This ring may be seen in the laboratory by passing the blue light
of the spectrum through a pin hole. In mid-blue its radius is about
12'. Various experiments show that this illusion is produced at the
margin of the pupil by the bending of the blue rays too sharply toward
the optical axis of the eye. These rays therefore focus in front of
the retina and on reaching it form a blue ring outside of the true
image.

Badiating Lines from Near the Center of a Blank Disk

The only remaining illusion to which I call attention is one of
much importance in planetary work, but one for which I shall not
attempt an explanation. Frequently in observing a blank white disk,
lines have appeared to me to radiate from some point near the center.
When first I observed lines of that character, not knowing whether
they were really there or not, I considered them genuine and for a
long time represented them in the form of a star with four or eight

ILLUSIONS OF VISION 473

rays. At last when they did not show agreement among themselves
1 concluded they must be illusions. This was verified by specific trial,
proving that such lines appear on perfectly blank areas. The rays
so observed are sometimes double.

Application of these Phenomena

Against the obstacles of bad atmosphere, minuteness of detail and
faintness, the observer has to wage a hard fight, and it is a matter of
congratulation that he sees such faint canal-like marks on the very
limit of vision. With full records the public may then discuss the
interpretation.

The ray illusion is to me a very satisfactory explanation of many
faint canals radiating from those small spots on Mars, called ' lakes '
or ' oases.' The only objective reality in such cases is the spot from
which they start. The reader will notice that rays on opposite sides
of a star are usually in line. So when two lakes or oases lie along
such a line they will appear connected by a canal. Nor do the oases
need to be very close together. A ray 16' long to the naked eye ap-
pears 4" long on a planet magnified 240 diameters. With the planet
Mars 16" in diameter the ray then extends one fourth across it. It
appears like a canal over one thousand miles long.

I believe the industrious observer has found and will find it difficult
to avoid instinctively placing his head in a position favorable to pro-
ducing combinations of this kind. After he has laboriously memorized
the leading details, so that he may recognize what he sees, when, for
an instant, Heaven vouchsafes him a brief view, he naturally has a
powerful inclination always to observe in the same posture, for he
finds that with a slight movement of his head his structure of fainter
canals is liable to disorganization. This insistence upon the same
attitude is at once understood when we consider a larger part of the
faint canals to be due to rays in the eye.

We have here the medicine to prevent this disease in the future.
Let the observer constantly vary the position of the head. As soon
as the seeing becomes sufficiently good to reveal fine detail, let the
movement of the head begin. A rotation through an arc of twenty
or thirty degrees ought to be large enough to test thoroughly any
fancied combination of canals. Drawings carefully made in this way
will have one source of error eliminated.

The halo with its light area and secondary image accounts for
details which have no objective reality, such as bright limbs of definite
width, canals paralleling the limb or dark areas, numerous light mar-
gins along dark areas and light areas in the midst of dark — abundantly
exemplified in Schiaparelli's map of 1881-2.

When a ribbon-like mark has sufficient width, it must appear

474 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

double; for the positive secondary image of the adjacent light areas
will appear within it. To this end its apparent width to the naked
eye must be some 8' or 10' (if eyes are alike in this dimension). In
a telescope magnifying, say, 400 diameters, this width need be only
a little over 1". If the planet is 16" in diameter (a rough average
of its favorable position in recent years) this will amount to closely
10° on its surface. Now the double canals of Schiaparelli, in 1881-2,
and of Perrotin and Thallon, in 1886, are frankly of this width and,
I believe, are due to this cause. In any case the test to be applied is
evidently the relation between the apparent width of a double and the
radius of the halo illusion. The prevention of error in the future will
evidently be the application of different powers to each canal, par-
ticularly a low power which will make its width appear less than 6'.
This must be done with care for low powers increase the number of rays.

The halo illusion is also responsible for marginal canals. When
a dark area becomes 6' or 8' wide, it appears double, having a light
interior and dark edges. With any increase of width the dark edges,
giving the effect of the marginal canals, remain. Hence along the
edge of any dark area there appears a fictitious canal. Professor E. W.
Maunder observed this in his excellent artificial planet study of a few
years ago. I believe that high powers by reducing contrast will help
to eliminate this error.

The mention of the chromatic rings draws attention to chromatic
aberration in the eye and in the telescope. This effect in the telescope
is so great that colors in a refracting telescope are not in the least
trustworthy. The blue-green tint attributed to the dark areas on Mars
is a product of the telescope. Its existence on our neighbor can only
be verified by the use of a reflector.

Thus in conclusion we see that there are fundamental defects in
the human eye producing faint canal illusions, that these have worked
serious injury to our observations in the past and that in the future
they may be avoided chiefly by the simple expedients of varying the
position of the head and using a wide range of magnifying power.

THE rUOGBESS OF SCIENCE

475

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

BERT HE LOT AXD M0I88AN

In the deaths of Berthelot and
Moissan, France has lost its most
illustrious chemists and the world two
of its leading men of science. At the
celebration held at the Sorbonne in
1901 in honor of the jubilee of the
scientific work of Berthelot, Moissan
said in his address : " As soon as you
touch a question you extend it by
generalizing it." The two great chem-
ists indeed typify the changing condi-
tions of scientific performance and of
the scientific career. The more than
a thousand publications of Berthelot
cover a great part of the field of chem-
istry ranging from minute researches
to the widest generalizations. He was
a historian, an archeologist, a man of
letters, an educational administrator
and a statesman as well as a chemist.
Moissan, on the other hand, obtained
eminence by methods which it appears
must become more common with the
increasing specialization of science —

intensive work in a comparatively nar-
row field.

Marcelin Pierre Eugene Berthelot
was born eighty years ago, the son
of a physician. His first scientific
work, published in 1850, was on a
method of liquefying gases. His thesis
for the doctorate was on glycerine and
the fats, opening up important ques-
tions in organic chemistry, which he
followed by his work in synthesizing
fundamental organic compounds, such
as alcohol, acetylene and benzene.
Berthelot then spent fifteen years
attempting to lay the foundation of
chemical mechanics by a study of the
heat changes involved in chemical re-
actions. While all his principles have
j not been accepted, this work is one
| of the most important in the history
j of chemistry, both as regards detailed
I discoveries and broad generalizations.
One of its incidental results was his
study of explosives and the theory of
] explosion. Berthelot next turned his

Plaque Struck in Honor of Berthelot on the Occasion of the Jubilee

of His_Scientific Work.

476

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

HENRI MOISSAN

attention to problems of vegetable
chemistry, discovering the methods by
which free nitrogen can be fixed under
the influence of electrical discharge
and the part played by the microbes
of the soil in the fixation of nitrogen.
For these researches a laboratory was
built for him at Meudon. At the same

time Berthelot published a series of
important works on the history of
chemistry and of alchemy, showing
wide scholarship and archeological re-
search. He also published a series of
works on the philosophy of science, of
ethics and of education.

Berthelot was active in public af-

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

All

fairs. During the siege of Paris he
was president of the committee on de-
fense, in 1876 he was appointed
inspector general of higher education
and in 18S1 he was made a life senator.
He was for a time minister of public
instruction and later minister of for-
eign affairs. He was for many years
permanent secretary of the Paris
Academy of Sciences and was a member
of the French Academy.

Returning from a meeting of the
academy, Berthelot survived the shock
of his wife's death by only a few
minutes. The public funeral voted by
the parliament before its adjournment
as a mark of respect, the ceremonies
of the national funeral at the Pantheon
and the closing of all schools in France
demonstrate in how high honor the
French people hold their eminent men
of science.

Henri Moissan was born in 1852,
and his first work, published in 1874,
was concerned with the absorption of
oxygen and the emission of carbonic
acid by plants kept in a darkened
room. In 1880 he received the doc-
torate of science for work on the
oxides of the metals of the iron group.
He became eminent for his work on the
isolation of fluorine, which he com-
municated to the Paris Academy in
1886, and which was followed by im-
portant researches on the chemical and
physical properties of fluorine and its
compounds. Subsequently Moissan
took up the subject of high tempera-
ture researches, and became popularly
known for the artificial production of
diamonds. In his work with the elec-
tric furnace, Moissan investigated in
detail a number of individual chemical
reactions, including the formation of
calcium carbide, which have been of
great importance for the progress of
inorganic chemistry. Moissan was
elected a member of the Academy of
Sciences in 1891, and, after teaching

in the Ecole superieure de Pharmacie,
became professor of inorganic chem-
istry at the Sorbonne in 1900.

TEE FOUNDERS OF TEE MEDICAL
DEPARTMENT OF TEE JOENS

E0PKIN8 UNIVERSITY
The portrait group of Drs. Halstead,
Kelly, Osier and Welch of the medical
department of the Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity, painted by Mr. John S. Sar-
gent, and here reproduced, has now
been brought to the country and
formally presented to the university
by Miss Garrett. The painting is
highly esteemed as a work of art, the
critic of the London Times holding
that it will do more to perpetuate the
names of the subjects than their sci-
entific achievements. However this
may be, the work of these men and
their associates, whether recognized or
not, is and will remain an important
part of the foundation of higher educa-
tion in the United States.

When the Johns Hopkins University
was opened in 1876, it set new
standards of university work. For the
first time in this country graduate
work, research and publication were
given their proper place. The men
who taught and advanced knowledge
and the men who advanced knowledge
as they learned were the university
rather than the buildings and equip-
ment. The establishment of the medi-
cal department in 1893 did for medical
education and for professional educa-
tion what the university had done
earlier for graduate work. Here for
the first time to the fullest degree
were united broad culture, expert
training and research work. In some
ways the achievement of the medical
department has been even more notable
than the earlier performance of the
graduate department. In 1876 the
time was ripe for a university, and a
considerable endowment was available
at Baltimore free from conditions. In
1893 a broadening of the medical cur-
riculum was evidently needed, but the
Johns Hopkins had less means than
the other institutions. It accom-
plished what it did by bringing
together a group of men notable for

47§

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Portrait Group of Drs. Halstead, Kelly, Osler and Welch, of the Medical
Department of the Johns Hopkins University.

broad culture, professional skill and
scientific research, and their spirit and
example has made the medical de-
partment of the Johns Hopkins Uni-
versity a model of what a medical
school should be.

THE DIRECTORSHIP OF THE U. S.
GEOLOGICAL SURVEY

Dr. George Otis Smith has been
appointed director of the U. S. Geo-
logical Survey to fill the vacancy
caused by the election of Dr. Charles
D. Walcott to the secretaryship of the
Smithsonian Institution. Dr. Smith
received the bachelor of arts degree

from Colby College in 1893, and the
doctorate of philosophy from the
Johns Hopkins University in 189G, in
which year he was appointed assistant
geologist to the Geological Survey,
being made geologist in 1901. He has
had charge of the geological work in
New England and of work in petrology.
The work of the survey has de-
veloped with remarkable rapidity
under the direction of Dr. Walcott, the
appropriation for the current year be-
ing in the neighborhood of a million
and a half dollars, and the directorship
of the survey having become one of
the most important and influenti; 1

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

479

Dr. CHARLES D. WALCOTT

SECRETARY OF THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION

scientific offices in the country. On
March 13, the retiring director was
entertained at a banquet by his col-
leagues, which was attended by some
two hundred and fifty members of the
survey, and their guests. Colonel H.
C. Rizer, chief clerk, presided, and
addresses were made by representatives
of the different departments of work:

Mr. Bailey Willis spoke for the geo-
logic branch, Mr. W. M. Beaman for
the topographic branch, Mr. M. 0.
Leighton for the water resources
branch, Mr. S. J. Kiibel for the divi-
sion of engraving, and Mr. F. H.
Newell for the reclamation service.
Dr. Charles B. Dudley spoke of the
fuel-testing work of the Geological

480

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Survey. A letter from Mr. Arnold
Hague was read, as also a telegram
from Mr. Henry Gannett. Mr. Gif-
ford Pinchot paid a tribute to Mr.
Walcott in relation to the forestry
work of the government. The closing
address was by the Hon. James R.
Garfield, secretary of the interior.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS
We regret to record the deaths of
Professor W. H. Bakhus-Rooseboom,
professor of physical chemistry at
Amsterdam; of M. Marcel Bertrand,
professor of geology in the Paris
School of Mines, and of Professor
Ernst von Bergmann, the distinguished
German surgeon.

Lord Lister celebrated his eightieth
birthday on April 4, on which occasion
it was announced that a collected edi-
tion of his scientific papers would be
published. — The London Society of
Dyes and Colors has founded in honor
of Sir William Pcrkin a Perkin medal
to be conferred for scientific and in-
dustrial work connected with the dye-
ing industries. — Professor George T.
Ladd, who recently retired from the
active duties of the chair of phi-
losophy at Yale University, has gone
from Japan to Korea, at the invitation
of Marquis Ito, in the interest of the
educational development of the coun-
try.— The Prussian ministry of educa-
tion has appointed Professor Felix
Adler as Theodore Roosevelt professor
in the University of Berlin for the
year 1908-09, upon the nomination of
the trustees of Columbia University,
where he holds the chair of political
and social ethics.

The new buildings of the Carnegie
Institute at Pittsburg were dedicated
with imposing ceremonies on April 11,
in the presence of a large number of
invited guests from Europe and the
United States. The ceremonies were
extended through three days. Previous
to the dedication it was announced
that Mr. Carnegie had given $6,000,-
000 — four million to be added to its
endowment and two million for the
Technical Schools, half for further
buildings and half for endowment.

At the meeting of the Association
of American Agricultural Colleges and
Experiment Stations at Baton Rouge
last November a resolution was adopted
instructing the incoming president of
the association to appoint a commis-
sion of five persons to inquire into and
report to the association on the or-
ganization and policy that should pre-
vail in the expenditure of public money
provided for experimentation and re-
search in agriculture. The president
of the association, Dean L. H. Bailey,
of Cornell University, has appointed
the following commission, the first two
representing persons outside agricul-
tural investigations, the second two
representing the association, and the
last representing the Department of
Agriculture: David Starr Jordan,
president of Leland Stanford Univer-
sity, chairman; Carroll D. Wright,
president of Clark College; H. P.
Armsby, director of the Pennsylvania
State College Agricultural Experiment
Station; W. H. Jordan, director of the
New York State Experiment Station;
Gifford Pinchot, forester, U. S. Depart-
ment of Agriculture.

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE

MONTHLY

JUNE, 1907

THE PEOBLEM OF AGE, GROWTH AND DEATH.1

By CHARLES SEDGWICK MINOT, LL.D., D.Sc.

JAMES STILLMAN PROFESSOR OF COMPARATIVE ANATOMY IN THE HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL.

I. The Condition of Old Age

r|^HE subject of age has ever been one which has attracted human
-*- thought. It leads us so near to the great mysteries that all
thinkers have contemplated it, and many are the writers who from
the literary point of view have presented us, sometimes with profound
thought, often with beautiful images connected with the change from
youth to old age. We need but to think of two books familiar more
or less to us all — that ancient classic, Cicero's De Senectute, the great
book on age, one might almost say, from the literary standpoint, and
that of our own fellow-citizen, my former teacher and professor at
the Medical School, Dr. Holmes, who in his delightful ' Autocrat '
offers to us some of his charming speculations upon age. From the
time of Cicero to the time of Holmes numerous authors have written
on old age, yet among them all we shall scarcely find any one who
had title to be considered as a scientific writer upon the subject.
Longevity is indeed a strange and difficult problem. Many of you
doubtless have had your attention directed recently to the republished
translation of Connaro's famous work and know how sensible that is,
and as you read it you must have perceived how little in the practical
aspect of the matter we have passed beyond the advice which old
Connaro gave to us. And yet silently in the medical laboratories,
and in the physiological and anatomical institutes of various univer-
sities, we have been gathering more accurate information as to what
is the condition of persons who are very old.

1 Lectures delivered at the Lowell Institute, Boston, March, 1907.
VOL. LXX. — 31.

482

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

We know, first of all, from our common observation, that the very
old grow shorter in stature. We see that they are not so tall as in the
prime of life. The figures which have been compiled upon this sub-
ject are instructive, for they show that at the age of some thirty years
the average height of men — these figures refer to Germans — is 174

Fig. 1. Photograph of Chevreul, taken on his one hundredth birthday. He was asked
to write in an album and replied "Que voulez vous que j'cScrive sur votre album. Je vais
£crire mon premier principe philosophique, ce n'est par moi, qui l'ai formule, c'est Male-
branche "On doittendre avee effort & Pinfallibilitc*. sans y pretendre." Chevreul was born
Aug. 31, 178G and died Aug. 9, 1889. For the privilege of using this portrait I am indebted to
Dr. Henry P. Bowditch, to whom the interesting original belongs.

centimeters. It remains at that, however, only for a short period;
then it decreases and at forty it is already less; at fifty decidedly less;
and at sixty the change has become more marked; until at seventy
years we find that the height has shrunk from 174 to 161. There it

AGE, GROWTH AM) DEATH

483

remains, or thereabouts, through the remainder of life, though there
may be a small further diminution. This decrease in stature is due
largely to the changes in the vertebral column. First of all there is
a stoop. The vertebral column is, to be sure, never straight, but in
old age it becomes more curved, and the result is a falling of the total
stature. But this is not the chief cause, for in addition to this the

-:- •

Fig. 2. Photograph from a Child at Birth. The original is owned by Dr. H. P. Bow-
ditch, by whose courtesy the present reproduction is published.

softer cartilages and elements of the spinal column become harder,
change into bone, and as that change occurs they acquire a less extent
and become smaller, and the result is that the vertebral column as a
whole collapses somewhat and thus increases the diminution of height.
We find, as we look at the old, a great change to have come over
the face. The roundness of youth has departed ; the cheeks are

484 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

■

sunken; the eyes have fallen far back; the lips are drawn in. All of
these changes indicate to us, when we think upon them, the fact that
there has been a certain shrinkage and shrivelling of that which is
within and beneath the skin. Expressed in technical terms, we should
call this an atrophy, and to anatomists the mere sight of the face of a
very old person reveals at once this fundamental fact of an atrophy
of the parts, an actual loss of some of their bulk, which is one of the
most characteristic and fundamental marks of old age. The gait
becomes shuffling, the foot is no longer lifted free from the ground,
as the old man walks along. He does not rise upon his toes, but the
sole of the foot is kept nearly flat and as he drags it cumbrously for-
ward it is apt to strike upon the sidewalk. This indicates to the
physiologist a lessened power in the muscles, a lessened control over the
action of these muscles, an inferior coordination of the movements, so
that there has been in the old man, judged by his gait alone, a physio-
logical deterioration as well as an anatomical atrophy. You notice
too his slow speech, often difficult hearing, and imperfect sight. All
of these qualities show a loss, and we commonly think of the old as
those who have lost most, who have passed beyond the maximum of
development and are now upon the path of decline, going down ever
more rapidly. One of the chief objects at which I shall aim in this
course of lectures will be to explain to you that that notion is erroneous,
and that the period of old age, so far from being the period of true
decline, is in reality essentially the period in which the actual decline
going on in each of us will be least. Old age is the period of slowest
decline — a strange, paradoxical statement, but one which I hope to
justify fully by the facts I shall present to you in this course. In
the old person you note that there is in the mind some failure and
also loss of memory — less mental activity, greater difficulty in grasp-
ing new thoughts, assimilating new ideas, and in adapting himself to
unaccustomed situations. All this betokens again the characteristic
loss of the old. And as we turn now from these outward investiga-
tions to those which the anatomist opens up to us, we learn that in
the interior of the body, and in every organ thereof, the species of
change which I have referred to as characteristic of the very old, is
going on and has become in each part well marked. Let us first
examine the skeleton. In youth many parts of the skeleton are soft
and flexible, like the gristles and cartilages, which join the ribs to
the breastbone, but in the old man they are replaced by bone.
Bone represents an advance in organization, in structure, as we say,
over the cartilage. The old man has in that respect progressed be-
yond the }routhful stage; but that progress represents not a favorable
change; the alteration in structure from elastic cartilage to rigid
bone is physiologically disadvantageous, so that though the man has
progressed in the organization or anatomy of his body, he has really

AGE, GROWTH AXD DEATH 485

thereby rather lost than gained ground. Indeed in the skeleton this
principle of loss is already revealing itself. In the interior of the
bones of the arms, of the legs, we find a spongy structure, bits of bone
bound together in many different directions, as are the spicules or
fibers in a sponge, and by being bound so together they unite lightness
with strength. As you know a column of metal, if hollow, is stronger
than the same amount of metal in the form of a rod. So with the
bones. If they have this spongy structure, if their interiors are full
of little cavities with intervening spicules acting as braces in every
direction, then they acquire great strength with little material. Xow
in the old the internal spongy structure is dissolved away and there is
left only a hard external shell. Partly on this condition depends the
greater liability of the bones in the old person to break. If we ex-
amine the muscles we see that they have become less in volume, and
when we apply the microscope to them we see that the single fibers on
which the strength of the muscles depends have become smaller in
size and fewer in number.2 The muscle has actually lost; it is in-
ferior, physiologically speaking, to what it was before. You remember
how melancholy Jacques reminded us of this fact in speaking of the
hose ' a world too wide for his shrunk shank.' His saying is justified
by the loss of the muscles in volume and strength. The same phe-
nomenon of atrophy shows itself in the digestive organs. Those
minute structures in the wall of the stomach by which the digestive
juice is produced, undergo a partial atrophy, in consequence of which
they are less able to act; they are not so well organized, therefore, not
so efficient as in earlier stages. The lungs become stiffened; the
walls which divide off an air cavity from the neighboring air cavities
do not remain so thin as in youth, but become thickened and hardened,

J 7 7

and the vital capacity of the lungs, that is to say the capacity of the
lungs to take in and hold air, is by so much lessened. The heart —
it seems curious at first — is in the old always enlarged; but this does
not represent a gain in real power. On the contrary, if we study
carefully the condition of the circulation of the blood in the old, we
find that the walls of the large blood-vessels, which carry the blood
from the heart and distribute it over all parts of the body — vessels
which we call arteries — have lost the elastic quality which is proper
to them and by which they respond favorably to the pumping action
of the heart. Instead they have become hard and stiff. "We call this
by a Greek term for hardening, sclerosis, and arterial sclerosis is one
of the most marked and striking characteristics of old persons. JSTow
when the arteries become thus stiffened, it requires a greater force

2 This statement is the one currently accepted — but I have found, as yet, no
exact investigation upon the relative size and number of the muscle fibers in old
persons.

486 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

and greater effort of the heart to drive the blood through them, and
in response to this new necessity, the heart becomes enlarged in an
effort of the organism to adapt itself to the new unfavorable condition
of the circulation established by age. But the power of the heart be-
comes inferior along with this hypertrophy or enlargement, and we see
that in the old, in order to make up for the feebleness of the enlarged
heart, it beats more frequently. In other words, the pulse rate in
the old person increases.3 We find, for instance, that at the time of

Mean
A&e Frequency

25-30 72

30-35 70

35-40 72

40-45 72

45-50 72

50-55 72

55-60 75

60-65 73

65-70 75

70-75 75

75-80 72

80 and over .*.... 79

Mean

Age

Frequency

Age

Frequency

0- 1 ... .

134

13-14

1- 2 ... .

Ill

14-15

2- 3 ... .

108

15-16

3-4

108

16-17 ....

4- 5

103

17-18 ....

5-6

18-19

6- 7 ... .

19-20

7- 8 ... .

20-21

8-9

21-22

9-10 .

^2-23
23-24

10-11

11-12

24-25

. . 72

12-13 ....

birth the pulse rate is at the rate of 134 beats to a minute. It rises
slightly during the first three months of infancy until at the end of
the third month it reaches some 140 beats a minute; it soon falls off,
however, and at the end of the first year it has sunk to 111 ; at five
or six years it becomes 98, and at twenty-one years it has sunk to 71
or 72. There are thereafter certain minor fluctuations in the rate
of the heart-beat with advancing age, but generally it may be said that
this value of 72 beats a minute is characteristic of adult life. But
when a person becomes eighty years old, it has been found that upon
the average the rate of the heart-beat rises and becomes 79 a minute.
Hence it is clear that though the heart is larger, it has to make a
greater effort, that is to say a more frequent beat, in order to main-
tain the necessary circulation of the blood. We see also, as we go back
to the anatomical examination of the body, that those important
structures which we call the germ cells, upon which the propagation
of the race depends, which present under the microscope certain clearly
recognized characteristics by which they can be distinguished from all
other cells of the body, that these germ-cells cease their activity alto-
gether in the very old, and one of the great functions of life is thus
blotted out altogether from the history of the individual.

Turning now to the yet nobler organs, especially the brain, we see

3 My friend, Professor W. T. Porter, has had the kindness to compile the
following table for me, showing the pulse frequency from one to eighty years.
For the first two months after birth, the rate is about 130, after the third month
140. The foetal rate is 135 to 140.

AGE, GROWTH AND DEATH 487

a curious change going on, a change of which old age presents to us
the culminating record. In order to study the weight of the brain,
it is necessary to compare people of the same size, for the size and
weight of the brain depend somewhat upon the size of the individual.
Now it has been discovered by careful examination of persons of
similar size that the brain begins relatively early to diminish its
weight. Thus in persons of a height of 175 centimeters, and over,
of the male sex, it is found that in a period of from twenty to forty
years the brain weight is 1,409 grams. But from forty-one to seventy
years it has sunk to 1,363, and in persons of from seventy-one to
ninety it has shrunk to 1,330. Women of corresponding size are not
easily found, and a more average height for women is 165 centimeters;
a woman of such a height is likely to have — among the white races,
be it always understood — a weight of brain of 1,265 grams, at forty
to seventy years a brain of 1,200, and at seventy-one to ninety years
a brain of only 1,166 grams.4 I give these figures because they show
that there is no guessing, but a definite, positive knowledge, proving
that soon after the maturity of life in the individual is reached, the
shrinkage of the brain begins, and then continues almost steadily to
the very end of life.

It is not only the anatomist, but it is perhaps almost equally the
physiologist who gives us insight into the changes, which go on in
the old. I spoke a few moments ago of the pulse rate, and of the
change which that offers. At first sight it seems as if a greater pulse
rate indicated an improvement, but if you recall the explanation which
I have given you, you will acknowledge that this is by no means an
acceptable interpretation, but that on the contrary the change is a
clear mark of enfeeblement. In the respiration, also, we observe a
like change. Here the comparison is not quite so easy as we should
at first imagine, because there is a relation between the size of the
individual and the respiration. The respiration, as you all know, frees
the body from the products of combustion, particularly from that
product which we know as carbon dioxide. The result of the com-
bustion going on in the body (which in its end term appears to us as
carbon dioxide expelled from the lungs) is to produce heat, to de-
velop the necessary warmth for the maintenance of the proper tem-

Ernst Handmann has recently published statistics on the growth of brain,
based on measurements at the Leipzig Pathological Institute. See Archiv f.
Anat. u. EntwicJcelungsges., 1906. p. 1. The following summarizes his results:

Brain Weight in Grams
Age Male Female

4-6 1215 1194

7-14 1376 1229

15-49 1372 1249

50-84 (89) 1332 1196

488 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

perature of the body. Now in the very young the bulk of the body
is not great, but the loss of heat is very great, and this perhaps can be
most readily explained to you if you imagine that you hold in one
hand a very small potato and in the other a very large potato, both of
which have come at the same moment from the same oven, and that
you have just started out for a cold winter drive. You all know, of
course, that in a little while the small potato, though it was as hot as
the large one at first, will have lost its heat, will no longer serve to keep
the hand warm, but the other hand, in which the bulkier potato is held,
in which the volume of the heat — we might so express it, perhaps — is
correspondingly great, benefits by the retained heat a long time. Es-
sentially similar to this is the difference between the child and the
adult. The child loses heat with comparatively great rapidity — the
old person at a comparatively slow rate. Hence it is necessary for
the child to produce more warmth in order to keep up the natural
normal temperature of the body. When, therefore, we find that in the
old person the respiration is diminished, and that the production of
carbon dioxide from the lungs is greatly lessened, we are not immedi-
ately to jump at the conclusion that the quality of physiological action
has been debased — that we see here a sign of decrepitude. On the
contrary, the change is the result of physiological adaptation, of suit-
ing the performance of the body to its needs. This is one of the great
wonders, one of the mysteries of life, of which we here have a sample,
the constant adaptation of the means to the end. That which the
body needs is done by the body. A child needs more warmth, and
its body produces more; the old person needs less warmth, and his body
produces less. How this is accomplished we are unable to say, but
constantly we see evidence of this purposeful accommodation on the
part of the body— what is called by the physiologists the teleological
principle, the adaptation of the reaction of the body to its needs.
There are innumerable illustrations of this, many of which are of
course perfectly familiar to us, although perhaps we do not think of
them as illustrations of this great law of nature. As, for instance,
when we eat a meal, and the presence of food in the stomach calls into
action the glands in the wall of the stomach by which the digestive
juice is secreted. The juice is produced exactly at the time when it is
needed. Innumerable, indeed, are the illustrations of this fundamental
principle.

There is another class of phenomena characteristic of the very old
which will perhaps seem a little surprising to you after the general
tenor of my previous remarks. I refer to the power of repair. This,
modern surgery especially has enabled us to recognize as being far
greater in the old than we were wont to assume; and we know that
there is a certain luxury, a certain excess reserve in the power of re-
pair, and that we may go far beyond the ordinary necessities of our

AGE, GBO]YTH AXD DEATH 489

life in our demands upon our organism, and still find that our body,
is capable of making the necessary response. Ordinarily the amount
of blood which we require is moderate in amount — moderate in the
sense that the destruction of the blood continually going on in the
body is not a very rapid process ; but if, through some accident, a person
loses a large quantity of blood then by one of these teleological reac-
tions of which I have spoken, the production of new blood is increased,
the loss is soon made up, and we discover that the blood, so to speak,
has been repaired. Or when a little of the skin is lost, it quickly heals
over. That again is due to the power of repair. Ordinarily so long
as the skin remains whole that power is not called into action, but
if a wound comes, then the regenerative force resident always in the
skin, but inactive, comes into play and produces the mending which
is such a comfort. So in old people, some of this luxury of reparative
power persists, so that they can recover from wounds in a far better
way than we should imagine if we judged them only by the general
physiological and anatomical decline exhibited throughout all parts
of the body. Some of the luxury of repair comes in usefully in old age.
Xow if we consider all these changes in the most general manner,
we perceive that they are clearly of one general character; they imply
an alteration in the anatomical condition of the parts; but it is an al-
teration which does not differ fundamentally in kind from the alterations
which have gone on before, but it does differ in the extent and in part
in the degree to which these alterations have taken place. When the
elastic cartilaginous rib becomes bony, nothing different is happening
from that which happened before, for there was a stage of development
when the entire rib consisted of cartilage, and in the progress of
development toward the adult condition that cartilage was changed
gradually into bone, thus producing the characteristic, normal, effi-
cient bony rib of the adult. When old age intervenes, the change of
the cartilage into bone goes yet further, but it progresses in such a way
that it is no longer favorable, but unfavorable. We have then in this
case a clear illustration of a principle of change in the very old which
is, I take it, perhaps sufficiently well expressed by saying that the
change which is natural in the younger stage is in the old carried to
excess. But there is in addition to this, something more, of which
I have already spoken, namely the atrophy of parts, and by atrophy
we mean the diminution, the lessening of the volume of the part.
There is a partial atrophy of the brain in consequence of which that
organ becomes smaller; there is an extensive atrophy of the muscles
in consequence of which their volume is diminished, and their efficiency
decreased. Atrophy is preeminently characteristic of the very old,
and we see in very old persons that it becomes each year more and
more pronounced. Indeed, it has been said recently by Professor
Metchnikoff, a distinguished Russian zoologist, now connected with the

49° POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Pasteur Institute in Paris, some of whose publications many of you
have doubtless read, that his conception of the nature of senility, of
old age, could best be expressed in a single word, atrophy. " On resume
la senilite par un seul mot : atrophic"5 That is his estimate of old
age. But that is not the only estimate of old age which has been made
up to the present time. We find one, which is much more prevalent,
is that which connects it with the condition of the arteries. Indeed,
Professor Osier has written this sentence — " Longevity is a vascular
question, and has been well expressed in the axiom that a man is only
as old as his arteries." Now these are medical views, not biological,
and you will find that there is a very extensive literature dealing
with old age in man based upon the conception that old age is a kind
of disease, a chronic disease, an incurable disease. Medical writers
have put forward various conceptions giving a medical interpretation
of this disease. That to which I just referred is the favorite one, the
one you are most likely to hear from physicians to-day — namely, the
theory of arterial sclerosis, that the hardening of the walls of the
arteries is the primary thing; it interferes with the circulation, the
bad circulation interferes with the proper working of every part of the
body, and as the circulation becomes impeded, various accessory results
are produced in the body in consequence. It is brought to a lower
or more diseased condition than before. And so they interpret sclerosis
of the arteries as the primary thing, because they can trace so many
alterations in the old which resemble diseased alterations, to these
natural changes in the arteries by which they acquire hardened and
inelastic walls, which prevent the proper response of the artery to
the heart beat, upon which the normal healthy circulation largely
depends. Another interpretation, very curious and interesting, is that
which has been recently offered by the same Professor Metchnikoff
whom I have just mentioned. He has written a book upon the ' Nature
of Man,' translated in 1903, and published in this country. It is an
interesting book. It gives a most attractive picture, incidentally, of
Metchnikoff himself, a man of pleasantly optimistic temperament, but
a man thoroughly imbued with the spirit which has so often been
attributed to contemporary scientific men, of cold, intellectual regard
towards everything, towards life, towards man, towards mystery. For
him mysteries of all sorts have little interest. Those things which
are mysterious are beyond the sphere of what can hold his attention.
He must reside in the clear atmosphere of definite, positive fact. This
mental bias is shown in his book. He reviews in a happy way various
past systems of philosophy; he describes various religions; and he
points out his reasons for thinking that all of these are insufficient,
that there is no satisfaction to be derived from any of the ancient

5 L 'Annie biologique, Tome III... p. 256, 1897.

AGE, GROWTH AND DEATH 491

philosophies or from any of the great world religions. Nevertheless
he is an optimist. He has noticed as a result of his meditations upon
the arrangements within our bodies that we suffer very much from
what he calls disharmonies, by which he means imperfect adaptations
of structures within us to the performance of the body as a whole.
He mentions various instances of such disharmonious parts. They
do not seem to me quite so imposing as apparently they do to him,
for many of his disharmonies are based upon the fact that we do not
know that a certain structure or part has any useful role to play in
the body. But I am inclined to suspect that in many cases it is only
because we are ignorant; the list of useless structures in the human
body was a few years ago very long; it has within recent years been
greatly shortened, and we should learn from this experience a caution
in regard to judging about these things, which, I think, Professor
Metchnikoff has failed to exert duly in forming his opinions on these
disharmonies. Now among the disharmonies which he recognizes is
that of the great size of the large intestine, which is of such a caliber
that a considerable quantity of partially digested food can be retained
in it at one time. When such food is retained in the intestine, it
may undergo a process of fermentation. There are many sorts of
fermentation, and some of them produce chemical bodies which are
injurious to the human organism. Bacteria, which will cause fer-
mentation of this sort, do actually occur in the human intestine.
Metchnikoff thinks that, as we grow old, this tendency to fermentation
increases. Now the bodies produced by fermentation, the chemical
bodies, I mean, get into our system and poison us. The result of the
poisoning is that the native capacities of the various tissues and organs
of the body are lowered, as happens in a man ' intoxicated.' All parts
of a man may be poisoned, not necessarily always with alcohol, but
with many other things as well, and such a poisoning Professor
Metchnikoff assumes to result from intestinal fermentation. More-
over, he has further observations, which lead him to the idea that
certain cells go to work upon the poisoned parts and do further damage.
The cells in question are minute microscopic structures, so small that
we can not at all see them with the naked eye, but which have a
habit of feeding in the body upon the various parts thereof whenever
they get a chance. Cells of this sort go by the scientific name of
phagocytes, which is merely a Greek term for ' eating cells.' The
phagocytes, for instance, devour pigment in the hair, and in old per-
sons the production of white hair has resulted from the activity of
phagocytes which have eaten the pigment which should have remained
in the hair and kept its color. But the pigment of the hair is not the
only thing they will attack; they will make their aggressive inroads
upon any part of the body; and Professor Metchnikoff has advanced
the theory that old age consists chiefly in the damage which is done

492 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

by phagocytes to poisoned parts of the body, the poisoning being due
to the fermentation in the large intestine. Now it has been observed
by some of the German investigators of these matters that the presence
of lactic acid interferes with this fermentative process as it goes on in
the intestine. Lactic acid, as its name implies, is the characteristic
acid which occurs in milk when it becomes sour. An Italian friend
of Professor Metchnikoff tried drinking some sour milk with the idea
of stopping the fermentation in the intestine, and so putting an end
to the deleterious change, and he believes in the short time that he tried
it that it did him good — quite, you see, in the way of a patent medicine.
Professor Metchnikoff, on this basis, has recommended, in his book
on the ' Nature of Man,' the regular drinking of sour milk, in the
hope apparently that that will postpone senility, and will leave us our
powers in maturity long beyond that period when we at present reach
the fullness of our vigor, and advance the period of time when the
changes of the years put us out of court. He regards this as an opti-
mistic substitute for the various forms of philosophy and religion
which many millions of people have found helpful in life, and cer-
tainly it is the cheapest substitute which has ever been seriously
proposed.

There is another writer who, though having a German name, is in
reality a Eussian, Professor Muhlmann. He has another theory in
regard to the fundamental nature of senility. He takes such in-
stances as that which I spoke of, of respiration in connection with
the production of warmth in the child's body and in the body of the
adult, and finds that the diminution of the surface in proportion to
the bulk of the body is characteristic of the old, and he concludes
that we become old because we do not have proportionately surface
enough left. His view implies, apparently, that if we could keep
ourselves more or less of the stature of pygmies we should be healthier
and better off. I confess these theories, and many others which I
might enumerate to you, seem to me to be somewhat fantastic — odd
rather than valuable. Yet they all spring from this one common
feeling, which is, I believe, a sinister influence upon the thought of
the day, in regard to the problem of age — they spring from the medi-
cal conception that age is a kind of disease, and that the problem is
to explain the condition as it exists in man. Now that is precisely what
I wish to protest against. What I hope to accomplish in these lec-
tures is to build up gradually in your minds some acquaintance with
the fundamental and essential changes, which are characteristic of
age and in regard to which we have been learning something during
the last few years— -I might almost say only within recent years —
and by means of this exposition to give you a broader view and a juster
interpretation of the problem. I hope, before I finish, to convince
vou that we are alreadv able to establish certain significant generaliza-

AGE, GROWTH AND DEATH 493

tions as to what is essential in the change from youth to old age, and
that in consequence of these generalizations, now possible to us, new
problems present themselves to our minds, which we hope really to be
able to solve, and that in the solving of them we shall gain a sort of
knowledge, which is likely to be not only highly interesting to the
scientific biologist, but also to prove, in the end, of great practical
value. Surely we can not hope to obtain any power over age, any
power over the changes which the years bring to each of us, unless we
understand clearly, positively and certainly, what these changes really
are. I think you will learn, if you do me the honor to follow the
lectures further, that the changes are indeed very different from what
we should expect when we start out on a study of age, and that the
contributions of science in this direction are novel and to some degree
startling. We can begin to approach this broader view of our subject
if we pass beyond the consideration of man.

If we turn from man to the animals which we are most familiar
with, the common domestic quadrupeds, we see that they undergo a
series of changes not very dissimilar to those which man himself must
pass through. An old horse, an old dog, an old cat, shows pretty much
the same sort of decrepitudes which characterize old men. But when
we pass farther down in the scale to the fishes, or even to a frog, we dis-
cover great differences. Do you think you could tell a frog when
it is old by the way it walks — for it never walks — or a fish by the
amount of hardening of the lungs, when it has none? Yet the lack
of lungs is characteristic of the fish. And what becomes of the theory
of arterial sclerosis when we go still lower in the animal kingdom,
towards its lowermost members, and find creatures which live and
thrive and have lived and thriven for countless generations, yet have
no arteries at all? They, of course, do not grow old by any change
of their arteries. But when we come to study these various animals
more carefully, we learn that in them the anatomical and physiological
features which I have indicated to you in my description of the changes
in the human being, are paralleled, as it were, by similar changes;
but only by similar, not by identical, changes. If we examine the
insects, for instance, we see that in an old insect there is a hardening
of the outer crust of the body which serves as a shell and a skeleton
at once. That hardening increases with the age of the individual.
We can see in the insect a lessening development of tbe digestive tract,
and we can see — it has been demonstrated with particular nicety — a
degradation of the brain. Insects have a very small brain, but when
a bumblebee, or a honeybee, grows old, as he does in a few weeks after
he acquires his wings, we see that the brain actually becomes smaller,
and not only that, but as I shall be able to demonstrate to you with
the lantern in the next lecture, the elements which build up the brain
have each of them become smaller and the diminution in the size of

494 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the brain is due in part to the shrinkage of the single microscopic con-
stituents. There is another point of resemblance. We find that when
one of the better parts of the body undergoes an atrophy, it becomes
not only smaller, but its place is to a certain extent taken by the in-
ferior tissues — especially by those which we call comprehensively the
connective tissues, which might perhaps be best described to a general
audience as that which is the stuffing of the body and fills out all the
gaps between the organs proper. In consequence of performing this
general function, they are very properly called connective tissues,
since they connect all the different organs and systems of organs in
the body together. Now in every body there is a continual fighting
of the parts. They battle together, they struggle, each one to get
ahead, but the nobler organ, generally speaking, holds its own. There
are early produced from the brain the fine bundles of fibers which we
call the nerves, which run to the nose, to the tongue and to the various
parts of the body. When these appear all the parts of the body are
very soft. Afterwards comes in the hard, and, we should think, sturdy
bone, but never, under normal conditions, does the bone grow where
the nerve is. The nerve, soft and pulpy as it seems, resists absolutely
the encroachment of the bone, and though the bone may grow else-
where, and will grow elsewhere the moment it gets a free opportunity,
it can not beat the soft delicate nerve.6 Similarly we find that the
substance which forms the liver is pulpy, very delicate. Those of
you who have seen fresh liver in the butcher's shop know what a flabby
organ it is, and yet though it is surrounded by the elements of con-
nective tissue, which with great zest and eagerness produce tough
fibers, it never gives way to them. The connective tissue is held
back by the soft liver and kept in place by it. The liver is, so to speak,
a nobler organ than the connective tissue and holds sway ordinarily;
but in old age, when the nobler organs lose something of their power,
then the connective tissue gets its chance, grows forward and fills
up the desired place, and acquires more and more a dominating posi-
tion. We can see this alike in the brain of man and in the brain of
the bee. That which is the nervous material proper, microscopic ex-
amination shows us to be diminished everywhere in the old bee and in
the old man, and the tissue which supports it, which is of a coarser
nature and can not perform any of the nobler functions, fills up all
the space thus left, so that the actual composition of the brain is by
this means changed. There is, you see, therefore, during the atrophy

8 The nerve fibers of the olfactory membrane arise very early in the embryo
and form numerous separate bundles. Later the bone arises between the bundles,
for each of which a hole is left in the osseous tissue, so that the bone in the
adult has a sieve-like structure, and hence is termed the cribriform plate. It
offers a striking illustration of the inability of hard bone to disturb soft
nerve fibers.

AGE, GBOWTH AND DEATH 495

of the brain, not only a diminution of the organ as a whole, but there
is the further degradation which consists in the yielding of the nobler
to the baser part, if I may so express myself. That, you recognize,
necessarily implies a loss of function. The brain can not under senile
conditions do the sort of fine and efficient work which it could do before.
Now if we go on from insects to yet lower organisms, we see less and
less appearing of an advance in organization, of correlated loss of parts,
and when we get far enough down in the scale, senescence becomes
very vague. The change from youth to old age in a coral or in a
sponge is at best an indefinite matter.

I should like, did the length of the course permit, to enlarge
greatly upon this aspect of the question, and explain to you how it
is that as the organism rises higher and higher in the scale, old age
becomes more and more marked, and in no animal is old age perhaps
so marked, certainly in no animal is it more marked, than in ourselves.
The human species stands at the top of the scale and it also suffers
most from old age. We shall learn, I hope, more clearly later on in
the course of these lectures, that this fact has a deeper significance,
that the connection between old age and advance in organization, ad-
vance in anatomical structure, is indeed very close, and that they are
related to one another somewhat in fashion of cause and effect; just
how far each is a cause and how far each is an effect it would perhaps
be premature to state very positively; but I shall show you, I think in
a convincing way, that the development of the anatomical quality,
or in other words of what we call organic structure, is the fundamental
thing in the investigation of the processes of life in relation to age.
We can see it illustrated again very clearly indeed when we turn to the
study of plant life, for plants also grow old. Take a leaf in the
spring. It is soft as the bud opens. The young leaf is delicate. It
has a considerable power of growth. It expands freely, and soon
becomes a leaf of full size. Then comes the further change by which
the leaf gets a firmer texture; the production of anatomical quality
in the leaf, so to speak, goes on through the summer, and the result
of that advance in the anatomical quality is that the delicate, youthful
softness and activity of the leaf is stopped. It can not grow any
more; it can not function as a leaf properly any more. The develop-
ment of its structure has gone too far and the leaf falls and is lost,
and must be replaced by a new leaf the next year. When we examine
the changes that go on in any flowering plant, we observe always that
there is this production of structure, and then the decay, the end or
death. At first structure comes as a helpful thing, increasing the
usefulness of the part, and then it goes on too far and impairs the
usefulness, and at last a stage is produced in which no use is possible
any longer — the thing is worthless. It is cast away in the case of the
plant life; and this casting away of the useless is a thing not by any

496 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

means confined to plants; it occurs equally in ourselves all the time;
at every period of our life we have been getting through with some por-
tion of our body; that portion acquired a certain organization, it
worked for us awhile, and then being done with it, we threw it away
because it was dead. Very early in the history of every individual
there was a production of blood, and then followed the destruction of
some of the blood corpuscles and their remains were used for various
purposes. The pigment which is in the liver comes from the destroyed
blood corpuscles, and it is believed that the pigment which colors the
hair is derived from the same source. The blood corpuscles contain
a material which when chemically elaborated reappears as the deposit
which imparts to the hairs their coloration. You, of course, are all
familiar with the loss of hair. It occurs to everybody, but did you
ever think that it means that the hair which has lived has died, and
that that hair which was a part of you has been cast off ? That is what
the loss of hair means to the biologist — the death of a part and the
throwing away of it, and it is typical of what is going on through the
body all the time. It occurs in the intestines, where the elements
which serve for purposes of digestion are continually dying and being
cast off. The outer skin is constantly falling off and being renewed,
and that which goes is dead. In every part of the body we can find
something which is dying. Death is an accompaniment of develop-
ment; parts of us are passing off from the limbo of the living all the
time, and the maintenance of the life of each individual of us depends
partially upon the continual death going on in minute fragments of
our body here and there.

Our next step in this course of lectures will carry us into the micro-
scopic world, and with the aid of the lantern at the next lecture I shall
hope to demonstrate to you a little of the microscopic structure of the
body and of the general nature of the change, which exhibits itself
in the body from its earliest to its latest condition. With such knowl-
ege in our minds, we shall be able next to study some of the laws of
growth. We shall gain from our microscopic information a deeper
insight into some of the secrets of the changes, which age produces in
the human bodv.

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 497

THE PROGRESS OF OUR KNOWLEDGE OF THE FLORA OF

NORTH AMERICA

By Professor LUCIEN MARCUS UNDERWOOD

COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY

WHATEVER may be the avenue of approach to the subject of
botany as a science, whether we work out the details of the
development, maturation and division of the elements within the
single cell, or seek to trace the race history through the detailed de-
velopment of a single organism from egg to egg again, or whether we
approach it through either the mutations or the variations of a single
species, the last problem of investigation as well as the first will bear
directly on the question : What are the relations of plants to each other
in the natural system of classification? In this broader sense all
botanists, whether they are only cytologists, whether they deal with the
fascinating problems of embryological development, whether they are
field ecologists, or finally whether they are just botanists pure and
simple, because they love the things of nature and can not help being
botanists if they are anything at all — all these are systematic botan-
ists, even though some of them appear to others as unsystematic, when
their wilder flights into the realm of the imagination cause them to
become mere theorists with no stable foundation in real facts.

So multifarious have become the problems that have entered into
the study of botany in these latter days, that it is sometimes difficult for
a layman, brought up in the ancient conception of botany as the mere
study of flowers, to understand the breadth of scientific training in-
volved in the development of a modern botanist; in fact, it is often
a difficult problem for specialized botanists themselves to understand
all the bearings of the highly specialized work of some of their fellows,
and the research student of to-day soon finds himself pushing out
into ground still unbroken, which his predecessors may have had
glimpses of from afar, but never really entered to occupy and cause it to
yield its fruits. I am speaking here of real students, not of those sutlers
and train followers that swarm about the rear of every respectable army,
and often try to pass themselves off for the real rank and file. Of that
large array who pursue botany as far as light comedy, because somebody
wrote ' How to know the dandelions in their lair ' and roll such polysyl-
lables as Taraxacum and Leontopodium glibly from their tongues in
order to impress the unwitting citizen of their accomplishments, we have

VOL. LXX.— 32

tyo IdAw. Bap t is tab For tab

Has z%pUntulMtibiproponmwimim#Uuinlwgua4 imitantes\ cy*
ttogtdJjHmv4nkUngHam^xprimtt\iitm0X'fitbfiqHentithughf_um
~hQ%inam\pofty elaphoglojfon cermnam)p6ftremo}ophioglojjonjer;
Jfcntinamjnfitper appAreniibmvna e region* mitnatium nomitiA-
torttm Ungms:propoJittim^eUAmlnm tmmrer, ££ contemphtor.

plolitt**

Pig. 1. Fac-simile of a page of Porta's work (1591) showing similarities in plants to parts
ol animals, hound's-tongue (Cynoglossum), bugloss (Anchusa), hart's-tongue fern ( Phyllitis),
and adder's-tongue (Ophioglossum). It is interesting to note that two of Porta's names are
still in use in a scientific sense, a third in a popular sense, while the fourth (Elaphoglossum)
was later taken up for a genus of ferns distinct from the hart's-tongue of Europe.

wtntm$ fHMK dun @ewm# mit^nfihm fja m m

tpargef B^pfRti*Scr garn a&er iff twtft&iiflf^Micfmwtti

Fig. 2. Fac-simile of an illustration of Bock (1587) showing the apple-tree, known varia-
tions oi its fruit including the 'sheep's nose (gilliflower), death's head and the serpent,' allu-
ding of course to its supposed relation to the fall of man.

Soo POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

little to say; they are of a class so foreign, that though often loud-
spoken, as foreigners sometimes become, they are not botanists to the
manor born and never will become anything but sutlers.

Far back in the early centuries, men looked at plants largely from
the standpoint of utility, and every plant not useful for food was sup-
posed to have some virtues of the healing sort that made it useful
medicinally. Doubtless many of these notions came from the real
presence of some remedial virtues, for many plants of the pharmacopeia
were known to the ancients; but in attributing so many virtues to so
many harmless succulents, one wonders sometimes just how far the
principle of dishonest graft entered into the dealings of the old sim-
plers with their nostrums. At any rate, volume after volume of
herbals was published, illustrating many common and often rare
plants, and sometimes in a very realistic way their real or sup-
posed effects on the human system. A few illustrations of these
from among the works of the fifteenth, sixteenth and seventeenth cen-
turies may not be amiss. Porta in 1591 published page after page
of illustrations showing fancied resemblances between plants and all
sorts of human and animal parts, and often the discovery of such a
similarity to some part of the human frame led to the unwarranted
conclusion that the Almighty thus pointed out to mortals a definite
specific in the plant thus possessing this resemblance. One of the
favorites among these early medicinal frauds was the supposition that
because the delicate stems and branches of the maidenhair fern were
really hair-like, one had only to steep them in water to supply an
effective hair tonic which, for growing copious and lustrous hair and
preventing incipient baldness, would place the danderines and herpi-
cides of these degenerate days sadly in the shade !

Many of these early herbals were printed in Latin as the standard
language of medicine and learning generally, but later they were
printed in the vernacular of the country in which they were writ-
ten, and often something symbolic of the particular plant they il-
lustrated was added to appeal more strongly to the mind of the
reader. We give an illustration from one of the larger herbals of
the sixteenth century, that of Hieronymus Bock (1587) in old Ger-
man, depicting with the apple the serpent and death that was supposed
to have been brought into the world by eating this really delicious
fruit. We also give a quotation from Parkinson (1640), whose Eng-
lish herbal is perhaps the most complete compendium of the folk-lore
of plants and all the other old dames' fancies concerning the English
flora that was ever written. Here every plant description and history
is followed by an account of its ' virtues,' often set forth in exaggerated
terms.

Concerning Salvinia natans, which he describes and figures as
'Lens palustris latifolia punctata/ Parkinson says:

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 501

'The Verities'
It is cold and moist as Galen saith in the second degree, and is effectuall
to helpe inflammations, and Saint Anthonies fire, as also the Goute, either ap-
plied by it selfe, or else in a pultis with barlie meale: it is also good for rup-
tures in young children. Some saith Matthiolus do highly esteeme of the des-
tined water of the herbe against all inward inflammations and pestilent feavers,
as also to helpe the rednesse of the eyes, the swellings of the cods, and of the
brests before they be growen too much, for it doth not weakely repell the
humours: the fresh herbe applied to the forehead, easeth the paines of the head-
ache comming of heate. Duckes do greedilie devoure it, and so will Hens if it
be given them mingled with branne.

The progress of world exploration that followed the discovery and
colonization of the East and West Indies and the mainland of the then
dark continents of Asia and America brought to European gardens
many unusual plants which later writers, particularly those of the
eighteenth century, carefully described, often with elaborate illustra-
tions, in publications emanating from these public and private gar-
dens of the old world. "We give a copy of the title-page of the first
work of this kind which describes and figures American plants.

JAC. COENUTI

DOCTORIS MEDICI
PARISIENSIS

CANADENSIUM PLANTAEUM,

aliarumque nondum editarum

HISTORIA.

*****

PAPJSIIS,

M. DC. XXXV.

CUM PBIVILEGIO REGIS.

It will be noted that this bears the date of 1635, only fifteen
years after the landing of the Pilgrim fathers, and is primarily a his-
tory of the plants of Canada which was then the synonym of North
America. A sample illustration will give one of Cornut's figures of
one of our common spring plants, and its name, Asaron canadense,
the same it still bears, will show at a glance that the binomial system
of naming plants was not only not invented by Linnaeus, but was in
common use almost a hundred years before he published a single line
on botany, and more than seventy years before he was born! Our
common maidenhair, the bulb-bearing fern (also illustrated here), the

Canadcnfmm Plant. Hiftoria.
ASA RON CANADENSE.

Fig. 3. Fac-simile of illustration by Cornut (1635) of wild ginger (Asarum canadense).
(Plate by courtesy of The Plant World.)

4 facohi Cornuti

FILIX BACCIFERA.

Fig. 4. Fao-simile of illustration by Cornut (1635) of the bulb-bearing fern (Felix bulbi.
/era). This with a plate of the common maidenhair in the same work formed the first pub-
lished illustrations of American ferns.

5o4 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

false Solomon's seal, the yellow bellflower, the Dutchman's Beinkleider
and many other common American plants are similarly illustrated in
this quaint old volume.

The early days are famous for certain quaint and interesting
collectors of curios brought in by sea-captains and other early sailors
from the four corners of the earth. Among these old-time naturalists
were Petiver and Plukenet, who filled huge folios with miscellaneous
illustrations of plants and animals from all over the world.

We reproduce here a single plate from the latter which is just now
interesting because it figures a fern peculiar to the caves of Bermuda,
and named from that circumstance {Poly podium speluncce L.), but
one which jugglers of the past generation of botanists have placed
outside its proper species, genus and even tribe, and have attributed
to nearly all parts of the tropical world except, alas, the very island
from which it originally came! We should mention in this connec-
tion the ' Natural History of Jamaica,' by Sir Hans Sloane, whose
plates are typified by his Jamaica herbarium over two hundred years
old, but still in a splendid state of preservation at the British Museum;
and also the work of Charles Plumier, who laid the foundations of
West Indian botany as early as 1703, and whose works are of vital im-
portance to-day in our study of the flora of our tropical islands. Later
on Mark Catesby explored the Bahamas and Carolina and published
with elaborate folio plates many of the characteristic plants and ani-
mals of those little explored regions.

The conception of a plant genus as a coherent group of species
apparently became crystallized by Tournefort, who published his Insti-
tutiones in 1700; in this work he gave many illustrations accompanied
by descriptive text in this first genera plantarum. Tournefort, like
many modern botanists, knew mainly the higher plants, and it was
reserved for Micheli (1729) to open the eyes of his fellow students to
the genera of fungi, hepatics and lichens, and to Dillen (1744) to
give us a foundation for the study of the mosses and the lycopodiums.
The plates of Dillen's Historia Muscorum show what he knew about
mosses with a hand lens a hundred and sixty-three years ago, and we
give a sample plate from Micheli showing the symmetric rows of slime
molds of the genera Stemonitis and Arcyria of modern botanical
jargon. When the next generation, less hurried and temporizing than
the present, comes to take up the question of plant nomenclature in
a really rational fashion, these names of Tournefort and Micheli will
be restored to their rightful place in a system that makes priority of
publication its corner stone!

All this vast array of early botanical literature, ranging from
ponderous folios with plates, often colored by hand, down to miniature
Elzevir editions, with typography that puts the modern imitations to

VwM.Ti2i.ar 3 ermuMnHJ .rum nz^uv ■£., Ytfrrgf* pwrudij a^iiiW't^ pCanU turtuiU pul>sjctritilruj \

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Fig. 5. Copy of a plate from Plukenet showing a medley of illustrations. His Fig. 2 is the
cited type of Polypodium speluncce L., a species of Dryopteris still growing in the Bermuda
caves. The name has wrongly descended to Davallia speluncce, a member of a genus and tribe
of ferns never native to Bermuda. (Slightly reduced.)

Clathroides

Qatliroidasxtfxm

Mia. A

ty.

IHBiJ

uiufpiciis Irancisci Z*QreiizffiahiUyiI)- <$tcphan£

Fig. 6. Copy of a plate from Micheli (1729) showing the earliest myeetozoa (myxomycetes)
figured under a definite generic name. (Slightly>educed.)

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 507

shame, finally became so voluminous and so lacking in a system that it
must needs be put in order. This was accomplished by Linnseus, who
proved in his ' Species Plantarum ' of 1753 that the indexer is some-
times as important as the real discoverer, and this may give encourage-
ment to the often unthanked class of librarians and bibliographers
without whose work our best efforts would often be squandered in
fruitless searchings of the literature of the past. Since this work of
Linnaeus has been fixed upon as the initial point of priority of
names, it is well to pause long enough to see how a page of it
really looks. Like many of the standard books even of recent de-
scriptive botanical literature it is all in Latin, which goes to prove
that in botany, at least, Latin is not a dead language. I venture the
assertion that as much Latin is read daily within the walls of the
museum of the New York Botanical Garden as in any building in
New York city, not excepting the departments of Latin in its colleges.

But space forbids us to follow farther the general development of
our knowledge of the world's flora as depicted in the various works
emanating from the geniuses of the generations. We can only men-
tion in passing a few of the landmarks that stand as beacons along
the course of systematic botany. Here is an early one at Berlin where
the brilliant Willdenow, though dying at forty-seven, gave us a rational
' Species Plantarum/ the fourth since Linnaeus and the first that really
described plants from their characters. Here stands another on Lake
Geneva where Augustin, most brilliant of four generations of De
Candolle botanists, commenced the ' Prodromus,' which was the next
great attempt to set in order our increasing knowledge of the world's
vegetation. Here is a third at Kew, where George Bentham actually
grappled with death and forced it back, that he might complete
his masterly ' Genera Plantarum.' And here is a more recent, wide-
reaching, and more useful if less brilliant beacon again set up at
Berlin under the leadership of the Bismarck of German botany —
who, though Eegierungsrath, modestly and democratically subscribes
himself, ' A. Engler.'

Turning now to the real subject in hand, let us take a glimpse
at the progress of our knowledge of the American flora. It can
be only the merest glance because of the natural complexity of the
subject; we must look at landmarks here and there, and note only the
general trend of a few of its more salient features.

Among the early observers of plants in the American provinces
was John Clayton, of Virginia, for whom our little spring-beauty is
named. He made collections of the plants noted in that province and
sent them to Gronovius, who published a ' Flora Yirginica ' in 1739 —
a work known to Linnseus and constantly cited as his authority for
American plants. Gronovius' plants are still preserved in the British

CRYPTQGAMIA ALGJE. lift

Chara caulibus aculeatts. Hort. tliff. 477. Roy. %<?&

21 4,
Chara major, caulibus fpluofis. Vaill. aft. 1719. />. 18,

A 3- /• 3-
Equ^tum f. Bippurts mufcofus fub aqua repens. F>luk,

aim. 135* £. 193. /. 6.
Habitat w Europae maritimls.

4, CHARA caulium articulls inermibus diaphanis fuper-j7w7jjr«
nc Iatioribus. It.gotl. zif.FLfuec. 99^.
Chara transfluens minor fiexilis. Raj. angl. 3, p. 133.
Habit ut in Europae maritimis.

TREMELLA.

1. TREMELLA fefiilis membranacea auriformis fulva. junipevim*
FLfuec. 1017.
ByfTus gelatinofa fugax , junipero innafcens. FL lapp.

Habitat in Juniperetis prim* mere,

H. TREMELLA plicataundulata. F/. ./#?*. 1018. mfat*

Tremella terreitris finuofa pinguis & fugax*/?/'//. mttfc.

52. t. 10. /. 14.
ByfTus gelatinofa fugax terreitris. FL lapp. 530.
Linkia terrefttis gelatinofa membranacea vulgatiflima.

Mich. gen. 1 26. t. 6j. f. 1,
Kofloc paracelti. ASt. pari/. 1708. f. 228*
Habitat in Pratis pofi plwuias.

3, TREMELLA feffilis membranacea auriformis cine*- Arnica!*.

rea. FL fuec. 1119.
Agaricum auriculae forma. Mich. gen. 124. t.66.f. 1.
Fungorum perniciorum genus 1. Cluf. hifi. 2. ^.276.
Habitat ad c\rhoicsputridas.

4. TREMELLA frondibus. ere&fs planis: margme cri- UchtnnMu

fpo lacinulato. FLfuec. 102,0.
Lichenoides pellucidum., endivise foliis tenuibus crifpis.

Dill. mufc. 143. ir-ip. f. 31.
Lichen tcrreftris membranaceus mollior fufcus'. /1//Y/&.

£<?#. 26. t. 38.
Mufco fungus terreitris minor fufcus, foliis e latitudi-

ne crenatis mufco innafcens. Morif. hifi. 3. p. 632.71

i>-. t. 7. /. 4.
Habitat in Mulcts * locis umbrofisad monies.

D d d d 3 S* TRE-

Fig. 7. Fac-simile of a page of Linnseus's ' Species Plantarum' (1753). It is interesting to
note that none of Linnaus's species of Tremella belong either to the modern genus Tremella,
or to the family Tremellacea.

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 509

Museum. A little later came John Bartram who brought to his
garden near Philadelphia many plants from the wilds of the southern
states, over which he collected extensively. His garden with its quaint
old house has appropriately been reserved for a park in which some
of the memorials of his labors are still growing. Peter Kalm, whose
memory is embalmed in Kalmia, the mountain laurel, was sent on a
mission from Sweden primarily to investigate the American mulberry
in the vain hope that Sweden might have an opportunity to compete with
France in the silk industry. Kalm traveled through Pennsylvania,
New York and Canada in 1748-51 and took back many plants which
served as the originals of some of Linnaeus' descriptions. Near the
time of our revolution another acute observer lived in New York,
Cadwallader Colden by name, and once lieutenant governor of the
province. Colden was also one of the correspondents of Linnaeus, and
a list of his plants was published from Upsala. But the real com-
mencement of our botanical exploration began with two foreign botan-
ists, who came to this country near the close of the eighteenth century,
and a third at a little later period. These were Frederick Pursh and
Andre Michaux, and later Thomas Nuttall. Michaux was sent from
France to collect living plants for ornamental purposes, and as the
result of his exploration took back to his native country more than
sixty thousand woody plants. In 1793 he crossed the then wilderness
of the Alleghanies into Ohio, going down the river as far as Louisville.
Two years later he went farther and pushed up the Wabash to old
Vincennes, crossed Illinois to the Mississippi, which he descended as
far as the mouth of the Ohio, and then up the Cumberland and across
to Charleston; he also went into Florida, then wholly inhabited by
Indians. Pursh traveled less widely, but his knowledge of the Amer-
ican flora was more extensive because of his contact with other botanists
who supplied him with plants from their own collections. Both
Pursh and Michaux published Floras of North America so-called,
although the North America of their day was practically limited by
the boundaries of the thirteen original colonies, with mere excursions
into the wilderness of Indiana on the west, and Florida on the south.
Michaux's Flora, edited after his death by Eichard, is dated 1803, and
Pursh's Flora appeared eleven years later. After them came Thomas
Nuttall, who, true to his English instincts, was an extensive traveler.
He was in the vicinity of St. Louis in 1810, ascended the Missouri as
far as Fort Mandan in 1816, and the Arkansaw as far as Fort Smith
in 1818. In 1834—35 he crossed the Rockies to Oregon and California.
The results of his travels were published in his ' Genera of North Amer-
ican Plants ' and other papers.

It was in the early days of the nineteenth century that botanical
activity commenced in New York. Samuel L. Mitchill was one of

510 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the first to give instruction in botany, in the intervals when he was
not in congress or the senate of the United States. After some strug-
gles David Hosack, his successor as professor in the Medical College,
secured the establishment of the Elgin Botanical Gardens in this
city by aid from the state of New York. These gardens were located
on the square bounded by Madison and Fifth Avenues and Fifty-first
and Fifty-second Streets, and although south of the lower end of what is
now Central Park, they were too remote from the New York city of
a century ago to be much visited by the public, and with the pressure
of other duties that came to Hosack they soon went into a decline, and
the state finally turned them over to Columbia College, first, to man-
age as a botanical garden and, finally, as this proved a white elephant,
to use for whatever purpose they chose. With strange prescience, the
college authorities held to their trust, though at times it was a financial
burden, and now this same Elgin Botanical Garden, once so worthless,
has become one of the foundations of a university's wealth. A fitting
memorial to Hosack may be seen in the two ancient yew trees that once
stood in the Elgin Gardens, but now flank the approaches to the library
of Columbia University.

But Hosack was more than a mere enthusiast over botanical
gardens. He had the gift of enthusing others, and among these was
a young lawyer with the large jaw so characteristic of the profession,
who afterwards became a teacher and finally went to Williams College.
Here he spread the contagion for botanical study, and his students
became so enthusiastic over the subject that they volunteered to
publish his lectures in a book which became the first of a series of
eight editions of the manuals of botany that appeared as precursors of
Gray's series of a later period. Amos Eaton owed his success to his
large jaw — what has sometimes been called the ' oratorical jaw ' — that
first impelled him to enter the law. Not alone in botany, but in
geology, were his auditors most enthusiastic over his lectures, and
one of the state legislatures in joint session invited him to repeat one
course before their body. Eaton was perhaps saved from the law
for a higher mission through the force of the law itself. For the
supposed mismanagement of an estate in Columbia county, he was for
a time placed in a debtor's prison in New York city. During his
confinement there he amused himself by interesting the bright twelve-
year-old son of the prison warden in the study of plants. Here Eaton
unconsciously did his greatest work in botany, for the seed, so fortui-
tously planted, took hold of that twelve-year-old boy and in later
years he was known as the Nestor of American botany — John Torrey.
But in those early days botany had few emoluments and no endowed
chairs. The time for botanical work must be stolen from his recrea-
tion hours when not active in his profession, so that while Torrey was

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 5™

first and foremost a botanist from choice, he was a chemist by pro-
fession, and managed to work at his beloved plants in the hours not
spent in an assaying office or in teaching chemistry to the students
of the College of Physicians and Surgeons. His work on the American
flora was perhaps the most critical that has ever been done, and when
we consider the meager materials known in his period, we are pro-
foundly impressed with his wonderful breadth of mind and the
accuracy of his knowledge. So well was Torrey known in 1831 that
Asa Gray, just through with his medical studies in central New York,
sought out Torrey at New York and commenced his apprenticeship in
botany under a master mind. What Gray afterwards became in
American botany he owed in large measure to the start given him by
John Torrey, a fact Gray himself was not slow to admit, and the
friendship of the two men never ceased. Torrey provided Gray a
curator's post in the old Lyceum of Natural History in order that he
might have the means to carry on his studies; he gave him the
encouragement of a father, as well as of an instructor; and he finally
associated Gray with himself in the preparation of the first great Flora
of North America, a fact that gave Gray at once a name and a stand-
ing among botanists abroad. The study on the flora early brought to
light the necessity of examining the types of American plants pre-
served in the collections of Europe, and Torrey, unable to make many
visits himself, made it possible for Gray to do this and thus come into
personal contact with the older generation of botanical spirits of the
old world. The call from Harvard came to Gray in 1843 and closed
the combined work of Torrey and Gray on the ' Flora of North
America.' Changes in our national history, to which I shall allude
later, shifted for a time the studies on the American flora, and before
the further publication of the work was possible, Torrey had passed
to his last sleep. Gray built up at Gambridge the herbarium and
garden that bear his name, and after Torrey's death continued his
publication of the ' Synoptical Flora,' but the work was left unfinished
when Gray died in 1888.

Contemporary with Torrey in his early days were two botanists we
need to mention. One was Stephen Elliott, who published a sketch
of the botany of Georgia in 1816-1824 and who may be fairly con-
sidered the father of southern botany. Elliott's successor was Dr. A.
W. Chapman, who published three editions of the Flora of the Southern
States before his death, and Chapman's successor has recently given us
an enlarged Flora of the same region. The other contemporary of
Dr. Torrey was French in ancestry, a Turk by birth, a Sicilian by
adoption, and a vagabond by nature, gifted, versatile, wildly enthusi-
astic, erratic, much maligned and never understood either by his con-
temporaries or by his biographers. His name was Eafinesque, which

5i2 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

lends itself in rhyme with picturesque and grotesque, and both these
adjectives fit him closely as the unique character of American botanical
history. So ardent was he in his desire for new descriptions, that
when there were no further plants within his reach, he took flight to
the clouds and deliberately classified the form of thunder and light-
ning. He published voluminously and so miscellaneously that
some of his papers are still coming to light. Much of his work
is worthless, yet there are veins of good interlarded among the bad
that it still remains the task of the future to sift and save. In his
crazy notions regarding the multiplicity of species, Kafmesque has
had no equals, a few weakling imitators, and only one real successor.

While the study of the higher plants was in progress at various
places, there were fortunately only a few to study the lower ones.
Schweinitz, a Moravian minister, commenced the study of American
fungi first in North Carolina and afterwards at Bethlehem, Pennsyl-
vania. He was followed in his study in the south by another clergy-
man, Moses A. Curtis, who attended to the spiritual needs of his
parish on Sunday, and on Monday started out in his old gig for
mushrooms. Curtis sent most of his material to Berkeley in Eng-
land for description, so that the types are at Kew. Later two thirds of
all our new fungi were described by Ellis, whose enormous collection
is now in the New York Botanical Garden, and by the veteran state
botanist of New York, Charles H. Peck, who alone represents the
old school of mycologists. The lichens were early studied by Tucker-
man, whose collection is at Cambridge, and the mosses by Sullivant
and Lesquereux and later by Austin. Harvey early studied our algae,
and he was succeeded by Farlow in New England and by Anderson on
the Pacific Coast.

Few students of the present generation are able to understand the
conditions that were the rule in the past. A generation ago, instead
of well-equipped laboratories of botany, the college boy was fortunate
if he could have either botany or zoology as an undergraduate elective
at all, and, of course, resident graduate work was practically unknown ;
if botany was given at all, it was only as a two-hour subject for a
short term when the common spring flowers were attainable, for botany
then was literally a study of flowers. The whole course of instruction
fostered by the text-books of Gray and Wood led only to a dilettante
sort of study which in most colleges was taken to fill in a snap elective
for an easy time at the close of the senior year. No one thought
seriously of botany ; it was a sort of fringe on the educational garment,
pretty enough, but only adapted to girls to be taken as an accomplish-
ment and classed with decorative daubery and other fancy work.
There were only three colleges in the entire country where there was
a distinctive professor of botany, and at the best of them there was not

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 513

enough of the subject in the course to make three points for a full
year. Asa Gray was professor at Harvard from 1843 to 1875, and
during those thirty-two years, with the large undergraduate body of
Harvard to draw on, and with the best facilities at that time that were
offered in this country, only a single Harvard man of that period ever
became a botanist. In fact, it was not the policy of Asa Gray to
develop botanists; he was an ambitious man and he thought to hold
the higher flora of North America in his own keeping; if any people
attempted to do independent work, they were immediately criticized so
roundly that only the bravest ever dared show his hand in print again.
But there came a revolt. Asa Gray was, to use his own expression,
' a closet botanist.' After his early days in New York he rarely went
afield even in the vicinity of his own home. He knew his plants only
as they were found in the liortus siccus. He never saw the Mississippi
or set foot on a prairie until he was sixty-two, and then took a single
hurried trip across the continent with Sir J. D. Hooker. But there
were others who studied afield, who knew their plants from their
living habits rather than from their fragmentary mummies, and one
or two were bold enough to make their own statements in opposition
to ' authority ' and to stand by them. One of these, a son of New Eng-
land, but broadened by residence in Illinois, Wisconsin, Colorado and
California, raise'd a standard against the one-man policy that had
obtained so long in American botany, and his work was the cause of
such mental strain that Gray's nervous tension could not bear it.
This revolutionist, stalwart and vigorous, in figure a hybrid between
the Farnese Hercules and the Apollo Belvedere, was Edward Lee
Greene, and his revolt was the signal for other and younger botanists
who soon followed him in the arena. After Gray's death in 1888, the
center of study on the North American flora shifted from Cam-
bridge, and new centers sprang up in Washington, at St. Louis, where
George Engelmann, one of our German-American botanists, had long
been at work, and in California, where Professor Greene then held a
university chair. At New York, where botany had been largely dor-
mant since the death of Torrey in 1873, the subject was revived under
the leadership of a young man whose modesty forbids my pronouncing
a eulogy on him living. To know how well he has developed this
center of botanical work one has only to visit the New York Botanical
Garden, at once his magnum opus and his monument.

The period just preceding the entrance of some of the older of the
present generation of botanists to their college studies was a brilliant
one in European botany, but all foreign researches were carefully
hidden away from us as youngsters. All the splendid work of Hof-
meister, of Nageli, of Von Mohl and of De Bary was unknown to that
group of American college students, and the appearance of Sachs's

VOL. LXX. — 33

514 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Botany in 1875 in English was the first intimation to many of us
that we had been grossly defrauded in our college course and fed
on the gray husks of the subject.

Following the death of Gray, there was also a concerted move-
ment towards a rational system of nomenclature for American plants,
following the practise of zoologists in certain points, and finally result-
ing in more fundamental methods of fixing the types of genera. The
first effort leading towards unification was expressed in the so-called
' Eochester Eules ' evolved after practically an all-night session of a
committee at the Eochester meeting of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science in 1892 and passed by a practically
unanimous vote the following day. These were modified the follow-
ing year at the Madison meeting and some unfortunate minor details
were introduced that brought about considerable antagonism. This
opposition naturally attracted to itself a considerable contingent of
morphological and physiological botanists who knew practically noth-
ing about the subject, and never took the trouble to learn, beyond the
fact that it produced some change in the use of names with which
they had become familiar. Subsequently the necessity for the fixation
of generic types1 became apparent as more serious study of the whole
subject advanced, and new features were introduced into what is now
known as the ' American Code of Nomenclature.' The mutual con-
cessions at the Vienna Congress of 1905 resulted in removing the most
objectionable features of the propositions of both parties in the con-
troversy, and in bringing about practical unanimity on this side of the
water. Old beliefs die hard, however, and the region beyond the Eiver
Charles appears to be an appropriate place for beliefs to die. The
doctrine of fiat creation as opposed to the doctrine of evolution died
there a royal death with Louis Agassiz in 1873 ; and after two vigorous
antemortem utterances on the subject by the generations past, the
Kew rule, the last vestige of personal as opposed to rational usage
in plant nomenclature, has recently stalked off the platform, and is
now, so far as America is concerned, a thing of the dead past.

It is interesting to note the effects of political history on a sub-
ject so seemingly remote as botany. Before the Franco-Prussian war
of 1870, German was almost unknown in our college courses except as
an unusual elective. French was then considered the one necessary
modern language. The unification of Germany changed all this, and
the German language at once took its proper place in our system of

1 At the present time the zoologists of America are struggling over this
problem of generic types, and ideas of what the principle really means are
actually penetrating the German mind, slower in grasping the real significance
of this problem. When this principle once takes root among the botanical
workers on the continent, not even the ' railroading ' methods of the Vienna Con-
gress will be able to stem the tide of real progress.

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 515

education. The works of German scholars, previously buried to all
but the select few, became more widely known, and many of them
were translated into English and thus brought within the reach of
all students. The German language has become a sine qua non of the
botanist in whatever field of investigation he enters, and a prominent
cause of the backwardness and decline of botany in England, during
the generation just past, is largely attributable to the fact that until
very recently few of their botanists have been able to read the German
language.

A few influences were prominent in bringing about better instruc-
tion in botany. Foremost among these was the introduction of the labo-
ratory method in biology, when an impetus was given by Huxley
and his students to zoology which reacted on the cognate science of
plant life. While the laboratory method has often been carried to an
extreme, especially in the exclusion of field work as a means of culture,
it has, nevertheless, resulted in developing in America a laboratory
technique that is the envy of even the astute Germans. It is a well-
known fact that with all the prowess of the German, it took an Amer-
ican botanist to introduce into the German laboratory the method of
the microtome with its serial section.

Another factor was the more general introduction of better text-
books and works of reference, a condition difficult for the younger
generation to realize. I have mentioned the first translation of
Sachs' Botany in 1875. This was soon followed by the later work of
De Bary and others. But even Sachs was too advanced for the average
student of the early days. Perhaps no single book did more to serve
as a logical introduction to the more advanced literature of the sub-
ject and to give to younger students their first broad outlook in botany,
than that issued in 1878 by one of the most successful teachers of
botany in America — as well as one of the most genial of men — Pro-
fessor Charles E. Bessey.

Thirty years ago there were, as we have said, only three professors
of botany in all this country. Now the species has become so common
that one is no longer a novelty ; in the colleges of America there are now
nearly one hundred botanical laboratories manned with from one to ten
botanists each. Thirty years ago there was a single botanist at Washing-
ton, regularly employed by the government to report on some new weed
that appeared, and to assist the congressmen in their annual gifts of
seeds to their constituents ; now we have at least one hundred and fifty in
the well-equipped laboratories of the Bureaus of Plant Industry and For-
estry at Washington alone, and nearly as many more at the fifty agricul-
tural experiment stations in every state of the union, where all phases of
botany, physiological, pathological and economic, are being arduously
pursued. Thirty years ago botany was a subject thought to be fit only

5i6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

for girls, but now it ceases to cause a smile when full-grown men take to
it seriously, though some of our antiquated coworkers in other university
lines still wonder how it is possible to teach the subject except when
the spring sunshine favors the growth of the early flowers !

Space forbids us more than the mere mention of some of the varied
divisions of the subject that under the hands of modern masters have
grown to be broad special sciences of themselves, though still branches
of botany. We need only mention the growth of paleobotany from the
days of Newberry to its modern phases, as carried on by Jeffrey and
Hollick; of cytology, under Harper and Davis; of embryology, under
Coulter, Johnson and Campbell; of ecology, under Cowles and Clem-
ents; of plant breeding, under Bailey and Webber; of mycology under
Arthur, Thaxter and Burt; of economic botany, under Fernow and
Rusby; and there are still other fields into which our science has
broadened.

It is interesting to note how the study of the American flora has
gone hand in hand with the political development of the country.
When Torrey and Gray published their first great flora of North
America in 1838-1843, the territory of the United States, which was
all it attempted to cover, was very largely east of the Mississippi.
Buffaloes and Indians held the great west from Arkansas to the
Saskatchewan. Texas was just struggling for freedom from Mexico,
as Mexico herself had recently struggled to secure her own liberation
from Spain. Colorado, Utah, Nevada, Arizona and all California
were quiet Mexican provinces undisturbed by the searcher either for
ore or for plants, as peaceful as when the first missionaries of the
cross opened up their missions among them, two centuries before.
Soon politics entered and commerce, its ally, followed in its wake.
The annexation of Texas in 1845 was followed by the Mexican war,
through which the region from Texas to Oregon came over as the first
great expansion of American territory since the Louisiana purchase.
Then on the heels of annexation came the discovery of gold in Cali-
fornia, and the wild rush towards that Eldorado changed that terri-
tory in a twelvemonths from a quiet colony to a great bustling state
clamoring for its full rights, and seeking to be joined to her sister
states, not only by the bonds of fraternity, but by the practical iron
bands of the Pacific railroad that made commerce possible with them.
In the wake of all this war, annexation, settlement, exploration for
railroads, came the botanical explorer, and the floral wealth of the
great West was poured into Eastern collections with Torrey at New
York, and Gray at Cambridge, and to a much less degree with Engel-
mann at St. Louis.

A word of mention is due to some of the early and later botanical
explorers to whom we owe so much in those days when it was less

THE FLORA OF NORTH AMERICA 517

possible than now for botanists themselves to extend their studies
afield and learn the flora in its native heath and study it in its asso-
ciations and in its relations to soil, temperature, moisture and climate.
Among these early field botanists was Charles Wright, who explored
Texas, New Mexico and Nicaragua, and all through the period of our
civil war and later spent his years in Cuba and made known the flora
that its native and introduced Spanish inhabitants had ever been
expecting to study themselves in their glorious manana, the never-
appearing period when this race does its leading work. Wright with
his boyish spirit was Dr. Gray's ' Carlo,' a name given not only in
sport, but seriously embalmed among plant names in Gray's genus
Carlo wrightia. Then there were Fendler and Lindheimer, both Ger-
man-Americans, who collected in Texas and New Mexico, and Fendler
later in Panama, Venezuela, and last of all in Trinidad, where he died
in 1883. There was also the old Pathfinder, Fremont, who made
collections in California and over the Oregon trail; and Parry, quiet,
open-hearted, the type of the sincere botany man, who ranged over the
great west from his home in Iowa to the Mexican boundary and the
golden gate of the Pacific. Later, Lemmon explored the high Sierras
and Arizona, and Brandegee, led on from his surveys of the Denver and
Eio Grande, left enginering for botany and explored from the Great
Basin to the lowest confines of Baja California. Both of these were
followed by the veteran collector, Pringle, who finding Arizona and
California too small for his ambitions, traveled year after year through-
out Mexico from Chihuahua to Tehuantepec. Time forbids the men-
tion of the many others, even by name, who, in their untiring zeal for
botanical exploration, not unlike those mentioned by the sacred writer,
" subdued kingdoms . . . quenched the violence of fire, escaped the
edge of the sword . . . out of weakness were made strong . . .
wandered about in sheep-skins and goat skins ... of whom the
world was not worthy." To these botanical explorers we owe a debt of
profound gratitude.

518 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

NOTES ON" THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SERVICE

By FRED DELAND

PITTSBURGH, PA.

IX. Telephone Line Construction.

IN 1876 the wires used for telegraph, circuits were usually of iron
or steel, because the tensile strength permitted of long spans and
comparatively long sag. At that period hard-drawn copper line wire
was unknown, and it is problematical whether the volume of traffic
passing over the average telegraph wire at that time, outside of the
main trunk lines, would have justified the heavy initial investment
required to string copper circuits. ThUs it came about that iron and
steel wires were naturally adopted for telephone lines.
About that time George B. Prescott wrote that

a very short experience with, copper line wires both in this country and in
Europe, proved that this metal was altogether unsuitable for the purpose, its
sole recommendation consisting in its superior conductivity, and it was, there-
fore, soon replaced by iron wire of large diameter.

But T. B. Doolittle proved how fallacious that theory was, by
producing a hard drawn copper wire in 1877, that, as stated in Chapter
V., proved of inestimable value to telephone interests the world over.

This failure on the part of soft drawn copper wire to satisfactorily
serve as line wire was due to the unpleasant habit it had of not staying
where it was placed; it lacked the physical stamina to support itself,
and would break with its own weight. This fact was well known to
telephone men. Yet few perceived the merit in Mr. Doolittle's im-
provement, or took kindly to it until forced to do so by later conditions.
In 1880, three years after Mr. Doolittle's experimental hard drawn
copper line had been strung in Ansonia, Connecticut, a telephone line
gang started to string a toll circuit between Hartford and New Britain,
but completed less than five miles. This circuit consisted of one No.
18 soft drawn copper c office ' wire, having a double braided cotton
covering saturated with paraffine; but by reason of the long spans
between the poles the sag was sufficient to cause the small soft wire to
break with its own weight. Thus, after spending several days in
rejoining broken ends, the circuit was abandoned, and iron wire strung
in its place.

In cities and wherever the iron circuits were subjected to the de-
structive effects of atmospheric action, especially where much bitu-
minous coal was used, oxidization shortened the life of the circuits in

THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SYSTEM 519

the pioneer telephone days, just as now happens thirty years later.
The prevailing belief among the early telephone men was that iron
wire would have an average life of from fifteen to twenty years. But
it only required a brief experience to show that many iron circuits on
city pole lines, even of extra best (E. B. B.), had an average life of
less than four years, and that rapid rusting rendered some circuits
worthless within three years.

For pole lines, chestnut was the principal wood used in 1876,
though there were also many white and some red cedar poles used, and
here and there a few locust and oak poles were occasionally utilized.
The number of poles then placed to the mile varied according to the
climate and the breadth of view of the owner. Ordinarily they
ranged from fifteen to forty, the average in the northern states being
from twenty-five to thirty, according to the downward range in tem-
perature. As a rule, poles 25 feet in length answered every purpose,
for there were no other lines to interfere, while 4-inch or 5-inch tops
offered sufficient support to carry the few wires required in 1878-80.

Now-a-days the approved practise in building telephone trunk
lines is to require selected heavy chestnut or cedar poles, not less than
eight inches in diameter at the top, and with a corresponding heavy
butt, and in length ranging from thirty to fifty feet, depending on the
contour of the country and the number of circuits to be carried. From
forty-four to fifty of these poles are placed per mile, while the depth
that they are set in the ground ranges from five feet to nine feet,
depending on the length of the pole and the character of the soil
or rock.

It may be recalled that in the first circular issued by 'the pro-
prietors of the telephone,' dated Cambridge, Mass., May, 1877, Gardiner
G. Hubbard stated that

telegraph lines will be constructed by the proprietors, if desired. The price will
vary from $100 to $150 a mile; any good mechanic can construct a line; No. 9
wire costs 8% cents a pound, 320 pounds to the mile; 34 insulators at 25 cents
each; the price of poles and setting varies in every locality; stringing wire $5
per mile; sundries, $10 per mile.

At the first glance the amount of material shown in that estimate
may appear somewhat inadequate, judged by modern methods of stan-
dard pole line construction, calling for forty-four poles to the mile.
Yet a moment's study will show that the proposed line was substantially
planned, was far stronger and would probably possess far better talking
qualities than some present day private lines. In an elaborate cata-
logue issued by a manufacturing telephone company in 1906, twenty-
nine years after Mr. Hubbard's circular was issued, the following
estimate appears :

To give something of an idea of the expense of building one mile of line,
grounded circuit (1 wire), we submit the following items. We do not estimate

52o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the cost of poles, which can usually be obtained in your own locality, using
twenty- five 25-foot, 5-inch top poles to the mile:

165 lbs. No. 12 galvanized B. B. iron wire $6.80

25 Oak brackets 30

25 Pony glass insulators 37

25 60-penny and 25 40-penny nails 25 $7.72

On February 1, 1878, the Bell Telephone Company of Boston, the
second of the parent associations, issued circular No. 3, reading in part :

When the (District telegraph) company does not desire (to introduce) the Bell
telephone, a District telephone company should be organized, and metallic cir-
cuits constructed, running from the central office to various parts of the city. . . .
The stock to be issued for the cost, in any case, should not exceed one hundred
dollars a mile of wire, including all fixtures.

Evidently good telephone line construction was considered too ex-
pensive to justify introducing the telephone in many places, for one
year later, the parent company issued a circular bearing the caption
' Telephonic Exchange System,' and detailing a combination of the
advantages of the different exchanges in operation. Therein it barely
touched upon the construction of line circuits, but called attention to
the now well-known fact ' that repairs on line ' are part of the current
expense, an item that companies organized during late years have been
prone to charge to construction and capitalize. But later, in 1879,
the third parent company issued a pamphlet of instructions from which
the following item is taken :

The line wire generally used is the No. 12 galvanized iron, and a line built of
this wire, if securely put up, will last for years without repairs. Where a
cheaper line is desired, No. 14 or 16 iron wire, or a small copper or brass wire
may be used, but smaller wires than No. 12 are very liable to be broken by
storms and high winds, and it is always cheaper in the end to use wire at least
as large as No. 12. In towns or cities the wire can be run over house-tops,
using small glass pony insulators and wooden brackets. About thirty of these
insulators and brackets are needed for a line one mile long. They can be nailed
to the side of a chimney, to the ridge-pole or side of a house, or to a pole. When
there are no houses to support the wire, poles must be used. These are generally
about twenty feet long, four inches in diameter at the top, and are set four feet
into the ground. Care should be taken to keep the wire from touching anything
except the glass insulators. The line wire should terminate on the outside of
the stations, and the connections be made to the instruments by No. 16 or No. 18
insulated office wire, which is wound tightly around the iron wire and soldered.

Possibly construction of so cheap a character was too costly to
meet the approval of many early operating companies, so to meet this
uneconomical demand for cheapness regardless of permanency, a new
set of instructions was issued by the parent company, which read, in
part, as follows :

Lines up to six miles in length can be built of No. 14 galvanized iron B. B. wire.
Lines over six miles and not over 25 miles should be built either of No. 11 or
No. 12 galvanized iron B. B. wire. Lines over 25 miles in length should be built
of No. 11 galvanized iron B. B. wire. We recommend the use of porcelain in-

THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SYSTEM 521

sulators, they being the best as well as the cheapest. Trees, house-tops and poles
can be used in the construction of a line. When fastening a line to a tree, let
your wire slack enough to swing to and fro with the tree, otherwise your line
will be broken during a windstorm. Tree limbs or branches touching the wire
have no bad effect on the telephone, but should be avoided if easily possible. A
pole should be set no less than three feet in the earth and eighteen to thirty to
the mile. Always try and keep your poles in a straight line.

The flimsy character of such cheap and improper telephone line
construction is readily apparent, and we now wonder why the local
owners should have been led into such expensive errors. Yet the waste
of thousands of dollars in construction of the cheapest character is
readily explainable on the ground that few had any faith in the future
of telephone service; it was an experiment that might require years
to demonstrate its value; thus capitalists refused to countenance the
large initial expenditures required in constructing pole lines possessing
qualities of permanency and stability.

Again, this kind of line construction was just as good, and in some
cases far superior, to that adopted by several telegraph companies dur-
ing the decade preceding the invention of the telephone. This is
shown in the report rendered in 1868, by C. F. Varley, a well-known
electrician of the English telegraph companies, who made a thorough
inspection of telegraph lines in the United States. Mr. Eeid states
that this report,

which was very minute and exhaustive, was a startling revelation of the condi-
tion of the American wires. The obstruction by imperfect joints, by relay
magnets of all grades of resistance, by impure wire, by contact, by defective and
neglected insulation was more or less universal. Many of the original wires
were small, naked, full of joints made in all conceivable ways, into which the
detained moisture ate a path of rust and ruin.

Eight years later, that is, in 1875, David Brooks wrote :

The rates of telegraphing in this country have always been high, yet but few
of the stockholders or those who furnish the money to construct the lines have
ever received any return for their investments. In most cases the Morse patent
was sold to individuals who organized companies, received subscriptions to stock,
and constructed the lines, deriving personally large profits thereby. Usually,
about three times the amount of money necessary to build the lines was sub-
scribed by the stockholders, and an equal amount of stock was issued for the
patent; so that those organizing the companies not only derived large profits
from the construction of the lines, but also held the controlling interest in the
stock. By this mode of procedure a few individual speculators have each suc-
ceeded in realizing far greater profits from the Morse patent than were ever
realized by its inventor.

In 1880, the parent Bell company issued further instructions that
it believed would be of service to the operating telephone companies,
stating :

It is advisable, where there are numerous wires, to have a cupola erected on the
roof of the building where the central office is located, and through it the line
wires are conducted to the operating-room. . . . The cupola is about six feet

522

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

square, eight feet high above the eaves, and about eighteen inches more at the
ridge-pole. ... It is better to have the cupola open into the operating room
when the room is in the top story of a building, and cleats are fastened round
the inside, bored with a number of holes, corresponding to the number of wires
required. . . . The wires, after entering are led to the lightning arrester, then
run through the holes in the cleats, which run round the base of the cupola, to

the ceiling of the operating room, along
which they are carried, on other hard
wood cleats, to the switchboard. . . .
Where the main lines are not sufficiently
numerous to render a cupola necessary,
they may be brought through a window

in the central office.

(Fig. 37.) The

line wires are strung on (pony) glass in-
sulators, which are fitted to wooden pins,
driven into crossarms. These crossarms
are supported on poles or house-top fix-
tures, which should be run in trunk-routes
through the city or town, branch lines be-
ing run to any desired point. It is advan-
tageous to use poles wherever practicable,
for the following reasons : Pole lines are
not liable to interference from household-
ers, being entirely out of their control ; they
are much more accessible at all times, and
when they are out of order at all the
trouble is more easily located and removed;
the cost is generally about the same, where
the number of wires to be carried does not
exceed forty or fifty. Poles should be not
less than twenty- five feet long, with a diam-
eter of six inches at the top; and should be set five feet in the ground. Before
being set up, poles should be carefully stripped of the bark, and, when used in
cities, should be painted. It is the usual practise to place all the crossarms on
one side of the pole, fastening them with bolts and nuts. It is sometimes, how-
ever, absolutely necessary to run house-top lines. Trunk routes should then be
selected, and along these routes structures must be erected at an average dis-
tance of about three hundred feet apart. Fig. 38 represents a roof fixture, with
four cross-bars, each bar having glass insulators on its upper side, and ' hook '
insulators on its under side, thus doubling its capacity for carrying wires.
Hooks being expensive, porcelain knobs may be substituted for them as an
economical measure. (A foot note reads: It is much better to avoid adding
hook or other fixtures to the lower edge of cross-bars. It is apt to bring the
wires too near together, and cause trouble from ' induction.' It should be done
only when new fixtures cannot possibly be erected.) A correct idea of a ' double
wall fixture' may be obtained from Fig. 3&. It is in many cases desirable to
use this style of fixture in preference to a roof fixture, as removing all danger
of causing leaks in roofs; or in cases where flat roofs are not attainable, or
where the point of support is necessarily a high party wall or the side wall of a
building. . . . Bad construction, necessitating frequent clambering over roofs,
while it may do no real harm to the premises, annoys owners and tenants, whost
condemnations and complaints soon reach the ears of others, and this is apt to
put stumbling-blocks in the way of securing permission for entering upon new

THE DEVELOPMENT OF TELEPHONE SYSTEM 523

premises. Besides these reasons, it can readily be seen that work is the cheapest
in the end that does not need extensive or frequent repairs.

Only the old-timers can appreciate what endless trouble was caused
by careless linemen climbing on the roofs of residences and attaching
wires, without consulting owner or occupant. For a costly experience
soon showed that many tin or asphaltum roofs that were in apparent
good order, before trespassed upon, were punctured or broken by the
negligent dropping of a hatchet or other tool, or by heavily walking
over weak parts. Then shingles and boards were split by big nails
improperly driven to fasten insulator or bracket, bricks were chipped

Fig. 38.

Fig. 39.

and paint knocked off. To the owner, the aggravating part was that
this damage was not likely to be discovered until the next heavy rain,
and then so long a time elapsed between the trespass and the injury
that it was difficult to say just who was to blame.

As the number of subscriber lines increased in the early days, the
necessity of longer and heavier poles became apparent. Then the use
of higher poles resulted in the attaching of more cross-arms to the
main line, until finally the principal object of some companies ap-
peared to be to determine how many open wires a pole line could safely
carry. For there are records of pole lines in many cities carrying as
high as a hundred open wires, while in a few cities from 150 to 200
wires were carried. What is said to have been the largest and highest
telephone pole line in the world was erected on West Street in New
York City. The poles forming this line were of Norway pine ranging
from sixty to ninety feet in height and carrying from twenty-five to
thirty crossarms each.

524 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE

By m. h. poincare

MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE OF FRANCE

4. 'Nominalism' and 'the Universal Invariant'

IF from facts we pass to laws, it is clear that the part of the free ac-
tivity of the scientist will become much greater. But did not M.
LeKoy make it still too great ? This is what we are about to examine.

Kecall first the examples he has given. When I say: Phosphorus
melts at 44°, I think I am enunciating a law; in reality it is just the
definition of phosphorus; if one should discover a body which, pos-
sessing otherwise all the properties of phosphorus, did not melt at 44°,
we should give it another name, that is all, and the law would remain
true.

Just so when I say: Heavy bodies falling freely pass over spaces
proportional to the squares of the times, I only give the definition of
free fall. Whenever the condition shall not be fulfilled, I shall say
that the fall is not free, so that the law will never be wrong.

It is clear that if laws were reduced to that, they could not serve
in prediction; then they would be good for nothing, either as means
of knowledge, or as principle of action.

When I say: Phosphorus melts at 44°, I mean by that: All bodies
possessing such or such a property (to wit, all the properties of phos-
phorus, save fusing-point) fuse at 44°. So understood, my proposi-
tion is indeed a law, and this law may be useful to me, because if I
meet a body possessing these properties I shall be able to predict that
it will fuse at 44°.

Doubtless the law may be found to be false. Then we shall read
in the treatises on chemistry : " There are two bodies which chemists
long confounded under the name of phosphorus ; these two bodies differ
only by their points of fusion." That would evidently not be the
first time for chemists to attain to the separation of two bodies they
were at first not able to distinguish; such, for example, are neodymium
and praseodymium, long confounded under the name of didymium.

I do not think the chemists much fear that a like mischance will
ever happen to phosphorus. And if, to suppose the impossible, it
should happen, the two bodies would probably not have identically the
same density, identically the same specific heat, etc., so that, after
having determined with care the density, for instance, one could still
foresee the fusion point.

TEE VALUE OF SCIENCE 525

It is, moreover, unimportant; it suffices to remark that there is a
law, and that this law, true or false, does not reduce to a tautology.

Will it be said that if we do not know on the earth a body which
does not fuse at 44° while having all the other properties of phos-
phorus, we can not know whether it does not exist on other planets?
Doubtless that may be maintained, and it would then be inferred that
the law in question, which may serve as a rule of action to us who
inhabit the earth, has yet no general value from the point of view
of knowledge, and owes its interest only to the chance which has placed
us on this globe. This is possible, but, if it were so, the law would be
valueless, not because it reduced to a convention, but because it would
be false.

The same is true in what concerns the fall of bodies. It would
do me no good to have given the name of free fall to falls which
happen in conformity with Galileo's law, if I did not know that else-
where, in such circumstances, the fall will be probably free or approxi-
mately free. That then is a law which may be true or false, but
which does not reduce to a convention.

Suppose the astronomers discover that the stars do not exactly obey
Newton's law. They will have the choice between two attitudes; they
may say that gravitation does not vary exactly as the inverse of the
square of the distance, or else they may say that gravitation is not
the only force which acts on the stars and that there is in addition a
different sort of force.

In the second case, Newton's law will be considered as the definition
of gravitation. This will be the nominalist attitude. The choice
between the two attitudes is free, and is made from considerations of
convenience, though these considerations are most often so strong that
there remains practically little of this freedom.

We can break up this proposition : (1) The stars obey Newton's law,
into two others; (2) gravitation obeys Newton's law; (3) gravitation
is the only force acting on the stars. In this case proposition (2)
is no longer anything but a definition and is beyond the test of experi-
ment; but then it will be on proposition (3) that this check can be
exercised. This is indeed necessary, since the resulting proposition
(1) predicts verifiable facts in the rough.

It is thanks to these artifices that by an unconscious nominalism
the scientists have elevated above the laws what they call principles.
When a law has received a sufficient confirmation from experiment,
we may adopt two attitudes : either we may leave this law in the fray ;
it will then remain subjected to an incessant revision, which without
any doubt will end by demonstrating that it is only approximative.
Or else we may elevate it into a principle by adopting conventions
such that the proposition may be certainly true. For that the pro-

526 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

cedure is always the same. The primitive law enunciated a relation
between two facts in the rough, A and B; between these two crude
facts is introduced an abstract intermediary C, more or less fictitious
(such was in the preceding example the impalpable entity, gravita-
tion). And then we have a relation between A and C that we may
suppose rigorous and which is the 'principle; and another between C
and B which remains a law subject to revision.

The principle, henceforth crystallized, so to speak, is no longer
subject to the test of experiment. It is not true or false, it is con-
venient.

Great advantages have often been found in proceeding in that way,
but it is clear that if all the laws had been transformed into principles
nothing would be left of science. Every law may be breken up into
a principle and a law, but thereby it is very clear that, however far
this partition be pushed, there will always remain laws.

Nominalism has therefore limits, and this is what one might fail
to recognize if one took to the very letter M. LeEoy's assertions.

A rapid review of the sciences will make us comprehend better
what are these limits. The nominalist attitude is justified only when
it is convenient; when is it so?

Experiment teaches us relations between bodies; this is the fact
in the rough; these relations are extremely complicated. Instead of
envisaging directly the relation of the body A and the body B, we
introduce between them an intermediary, which is space, and we
envisage three distinct relations : that of the body A with the figure A'
of space, that of the body B with the figure B' of space, that of the
two figures A' and B' to each other. Why is this detour advantageous ?
Because the relation of A and B was complicated, but differed little
from that of A' and B', which is simple; so that this complicated rela-
tion may be replaced by the simple relation between A' and B' and by
two other relations which tell us that the differences between A and A' y
on the one hand, between B and B', on the other hand, are very small.
For example, if A and B are two natural solid bodies which are dis-
placed with slight deformation, we envisage two movable rigid figures
A' and B' . The laws of the relative displacements of these figures
A' and B' will be very simple; they will be those of geometry. And
we shall afterwards add that the body A, which always differs very
little from A', dilates from the effect of heat and bends from the effect
of elasticity. These dilatations and flexions, just because they are
very small, will be for our mind relatively easy to study. Just imagine
to what complexities of language it would have been necessary to be
resigned if we had wished to comprehend in the same enunciation the
displacement of the solid, its dilatation and its flexure?

The relation between A and B was a rough law, and was broken up ;

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 527

we now have two laws which express the relations of A and A', of B and
B', and a principle which expresses that of A' with B' . It is the aggre-
gate of these principles that is called geometry.

Two other remarks. We have a relation between two bodies A
and B, which we have replaced by a relation between two figures A'
and B' ; but this same relation between the same two figures A' and B'
eould just as well have replaced advantageously a relation between two
other bodies A" and B", entirely different from A and B. And that
in many ways. If the principles and geometry had not been invented,
after having studied the relation of A and B, it would be necessary to
begin again ab ovo the study of the relation of A" and B" That is why
geometry is so precious. A geometrical relation can advantageously
replace a relation which, considered in the rough state, should be
regarded as mechanical, it can replace another which should be re-
garded as optical, etc.

Yet let no one say: But that proves geometry an experimental
science; in separating its principles from laws whence they have been
drawn, you artificially separate it itself from the sciences which have
given birth to it. The other sciences have likewise principles, but
that does not preclude our having to call them experimental.

It must be recognized that it would have been difficult not to
make this separation that is pretended to be artificial. We know the
role that the kinematics of solid bodies has played in the genesis of
geometry; should it then be said that geometry is only a branch of
experimental kinematics? But the laws of the rectilinear propagation
of light have also contributed to the formation of its principles. Must
geometry be regarded both as a branch of kinematics and as a branch
of optics? I recall besides that our Euclidean space which is the
proper object of geometry has been chosen, for reasons of convenience,
from among a certain number of types which preexist in our mind
and which are called groups.

If we pass to mechanics, we still see great principles whose origin
is analogous, and, as their ' radius of action,' so to speak, is smaller,
there is no longer reason to separate them from mechanics proper and
to regard this science as deductive.

In physics, finally, the role of the principles is still more diminished.
And in fact they are only introduced when it is of advantage. Now
they are advantageous precisely because they are few, since each of
them very nearly replaces a great number of laws. Therefore it is
not of interest to multiply them. Besides an outcome is necessary,
and for that it is needful to end by leaving abstraction to take hold
of reality.

Such are the limits of nominalism, and they are narrow.

M. LeBoy has insisted, however, and he has put the question under
another form.

528 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Since the enunciation of our laws may vary with the conventions
that we adopt, since these conventions may modify even the natural
relations of these laws, is there in the manifold of these laws some-
thing independent of these conventions and which may, so to speak,
play the role of universal invariant? For instance, the fiction has
been introduced of beings who, having been educated in a world dif-
ferent from ours, would have been led to create a non-Euclidean
geometry. If these beings were afterward suddenly transported into
our world, they would observe the same laws as we, but they would
enunciate them in an entirely different way. In truth there would
still be something in common between the two enunciations, but this
is because these beings do not yet differ enough from us. Beings still
more strange may be imagined, and the part common to the two sys-
tems of enunciations will shrink more and more. Will it thus shrink
in convergence toward zero, or will there remain an irreducible residue
which will then be the universal invariant sought?

The question calls for precise statement. Is it desired that this
common part of the enunciations be expressible in words? It is clear
then that there are not words common to all languages, and we can
not pretend to construct I know not what universal invariant which
should be understood both by us and by the fictitious non-Euclidean
geometers of whom I have just spoken; no more than we can construct
a phrase which can be understood both by Germans who do not under-
stand French and by French who do not understand German. But
we have fixed rules which permit us to translate the French enuncia-
tions into German, and inversely. It is for that that grammars and
dictionaries have been made. There are also fixed rules for translating
the Euclidean language into the non-Euclidean language, or, if there
are not, they could be made.

And even if there were neither interpreter nor dictionary, if the
Germans and the French, after having lived centuries in separate
worlds, found themselves all at once in contact, do you think there
would be nothing in common between the science of the German books
and that of the French books? The French and the Germans would
certainly end by understanding each other, as the American Indians
ended by understanding the language of their conquerors after the
arrival of the Spanish.

But, it will be said, doubtless the French would be capable of
understanding the Germans even without having learned German,
but this is because there remains between the French and the Germans
something in common, since both are men. We should still attain
to an understanding with our hypothetical non-Euclideans, though
they be not men, because they would still retain something human.
But in any case a minimum of humanity is necessary.

THE VALUE OF SCIENCE 5*9

This is possible, but I shall observe first that this little humanness
which would remain in the non-Euclideans would suffice not only to
make possible the translation of a little of their language, but to make
possible the translation of all their language.

Now, that there must be a minimum is what I concede; suppose
there exists I know not what fluid which penetrates between the
molecules of our matter, without having any action on it and without
being subject to any action coming from it. Suppose beings sensible
to the influence of this fluid and insensible to that of our matter.
It is clear that the science of these beings would differ absolutely from
ours and that it would be idle to seek an ' invariant ' common to these
two sciences. Or again, if these beings rejected our logic and did not
admit, for instance, the principle of contradiction.

But truly I think it without interest to examine such hypotheses.

And then, if we do not push whimsicality so far, if we introduce
only fictitious beings having senses analogous to ours and sensible to
the same impressions, and moreover admitting the principles of our
logic, we shall then be able to conclude that their language, however
different from ours it may be, would always be capable of translation.
Now the possibility of translation implies the existence of an invariant.
To translate is precisely to disengage this invariant. Thus, to decipher
a cryptogram is to seek what in this document remains invariant, when
the letters are permuted.

What now is the nature of this invariant it is easy to understand,
and a word will suffice us. The invariant laws are the relations
between the crude facts, while the relations between the i scientific
facts ' remain always dependent on certain conventions.

{To be concluded)

vol. lxx. — 34

530 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE AND ITS EELATION

TO THOUGHT1

By ALEX. HILL, M.A., M.D.

MASTER OF DOWNING COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

Tp OE a few years the great Samuel Johnson kept an academy for
-*- young gentlemen. It was not a success, despite the fact that
he had the two Garricks as pupils. Johnson was not fitted for the
work. Yet, little as Johnson succeeded as a teacher, he was himself
a monument of mental training — his memory colossal, his style the
classic for the English language, his wit so keen as to make Boswell's
six volumes of biography perennially good reading. If he could not
teach others, he had succeeded in teaching himself. We are bound to
give due weight to his views on his own education. To what did he
attribute its success?

When Langton asked him how he had acquired so accurate a knowl-
edge of Greek and Latin, ' the Doctor ' replied : " My master whipped
me very well ; without that, sir, I should have done nothing." " I
would rather have the rod a general terror to all to make them learn
than tell a child : ' If you do thus or thus, you will be esteemed above
your brothers and sisters.' The rod produces an effect which termi-
nates in itself, whereas by exciting emulation and comparisons of
superiority you lay the foundations of lasting mischief." The rod was
Johnson's instrument of education. What were his materials? What
subject did he consider as the most suitable vehicles of education? A
single illustration will reveal his whole mind.

Writing to a young friend who had asked his advice as to the
best subjects for him to study before entering the university — he must
have been a lad of fifteen or sixteen years old — Johnson says : " I know
not well what books to direct you to because you have not informed me
what study you will apply yourself to. I think it will be best for you
to apply yourself wholly to the languages until you go to the uni-
versity. The Greek authors I recommend you to read are these : Cebes,
iElian, Lucian, Xenophon, Homer, Theocritus, Euripides. Thus you
will be tolerably skilled in the dialects, beginning with Attic, to which
the rest must be referred." Then follows a still more appalling list
of Latin writers. Johnson " does not know the study to which his
young friend intends to apply himself." But, whatever his destined

1 Presidential address to the Teachers' Guild of Great Britain and Ireland,
delivered at University College, London, May 22, 1906.

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 531

profession — law, medicine, the Church or mercantile life — he has no
doubt as to the course of preliminary training. So far as one can
judge, his system was uniform and invariable for all kinds of mind,
for all walks in life — Greek and Latin driven in with the rod. " Boys,
be pure in heart," said Keate, the famous Eton Head Master ; " I'll
flog you if you are not." " Boys acquire a tolerable knowledge of
the dialects," said Johnson; "take in your knowledge through the
eye and ear if you can; but, if you fail to do this, I will undertake
to insert it through some other part of your personality." His recom-
mendations to his young friend are pellucidly ingenuous. He is to
apply himself to the languages and even to the dialects. There is
no pretence in this. No false issue is raised. Johnson does not for a
moment suggest that his young friend has anything to gain from the
subject-matter of JElian's or Xenophon's or Theocritus's works. The
scholars of the Eenaissance studied Latin and Greek for the sake of
getting at the writer's thought. They found that Greeks and Eomans
knew so much more than they did, and argued so keenly about what
they knew, that it seemed futile to medieval students to obtain knowl-
edge at first hand. Plato and Aristotle could teach them more than
they could ever find out for themselves. By the beginning of the
eighteenth century the wisdom of Plato and Aristotle had been ab-
sorbed into modern thought. The reason for studying Greek and
Latin had gone. Yet the languages had a firmer hold upon the schools
and universities than they had ever had before. Their study molded
the mind of Johnson, and has molded the minds of the greatest of our
statesmen, lawyers, philosophers ever since.

Why should the languages produce such admirable results? John-
son does not recognize French, German, Italian as coming within the
category of languages when thinking of education. They may be useful
for business, or even for lighter employment; but they do not train
the mind. Why should languages which have lost their purpose as
means of communication possess virtues which living languages can not
acquire? In a limited sense their uselessness is their chief merit.
Amo, amas, amat. The boy who learns the meaning of j'aime or
ich Hebe might have an eye upon the possible application of this
knowledge; but amo, amas — he would not be understood even by a
modern Eoman maiden !

If attention is to be concentrated wholly upon language as a means,
there must be no risk of distraction due" to the contemplation of its
possible end. "Waiter, 'mrangs!" called the little boy in Punch.
" Oh, Freddy, that isn't the way to pronounce m-e-r-i-n-g-u-e-s ! " —
" It's the way to get 'em ! " When we are working at a living language
thought passes on ahead to the end to be gained. It is only when
a dead language is being studied that attention can be wholly devoted
to its form. A modern language is studied with a view to 'getting

532 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

there/ as an American would phrase it. Only a dead language can be
looked at as a vehicle, with due regard to its carrying capacity and its
power of going, but with no thought of either its particular cargo or
its destination.

For something like ten years a public-school boy is daily exercised in
the analysis of sentences in Latin and Greek and in the construction of
sentences in the same style. He is working at languages which are
elaborately inflected, and articulated according to almost innumerable
rules. It is a mental exercise which is not supplied in quite the same
form by means of the analysis and synthesis of English. German,
French, Italian are troublesome to learn; but it is not the rules, but
their infraction, the perversities of the language, which tax the
memory. Greek and Latin are far from being guiltless of ' exceptions ' ;
yet their architecture, although more elaborate, adheres more closely
to a type-form than does that of any modern European language.
Each year the schoolboy becomes more expert in expressing, in Eng-
lish, the meaning of his classic author. He recognizes the force, in
the expression of thought, of case and mood and voice. He notes the
effect upon sense of the position and juxtaposition of words, and of the
substitution of one word for another which at first glance appears to
mean the same thing. And, since, psychologically, it is impossible to
distinguish between thought and the expression of thought, his power of
thinking develops pari passu with his capacity of giving form to his
thoughts. He acquires a feeling for style — the compromise between
yielding to the gratification of the ear and the businesslike jerking out
of words — the response to the music of language without forgetfulness
of its meaning — style, a quality which all the adjectives in the dic-
tionary leave undefined. A man who has had a classical education has
a craftsman's feeling for literature: he regards it as an artist regards
a picture. The only questions which a layman asks are : ' Is it beau-
tiful ? ' and ' What does it mean ? ' The artist can never quite dis-
sociate his criticism of the result from his consideration of the means
by which it was attained.

The mind-making property of the study of the classics has been
established beyond all doubt by innumerable experiments made upon
juvenile minds of all types. It does not appear to me that, in the
face of this mass of accumulated evidence, it can be regarded as a
question open to dispute. It is not equally clear that the study of
the classics stands alone in its potentiality of generating the power
of thinking. Owing to the monopoly of the classics in the best class
of schools, for the past three hundred years, other subjects have had
no chance of showing what they can do.

The teaching of the classics has, pace the reformers who are calling
out for improved methods, been brought to perfection by generations
of school masters, working under the guidance of daily experience;

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 533

riot aiming at the application of theories which might or might not
hold true. The teaching of { modern ' subjects has not as yet settled
into custom similarly guided by the observation of results. The
essential difference between the classical and the modern system is the
difference between training and teaching. A classical education is
practically a training pure and simple: a modern education is a com-
bination of training and teaching with mainly a teaching aim. In
the pressure and struggle of life it is undoubtedly to the advantage
of young people that they should, when they leave school, not only
have the strength and agility which will enable them to use any weapon,
but also skill in handling the particular weapons with which they
will be called upon to fight. Like most other questions, there is no
absolute distinction between the two systems — their difference is a
matter of degree. The parent to whom money is of no consequence
may allow his sons an indefinite — that is to say, a classical — training
in the assurance that they will afterwards get a surer and more intel-
ligent grasp of the subjects upon which will depend their success in
the battle of life. He is wise in allowing them to continue their
general mental training if he is quite sure that the delay thus caused
will not prevent them from making their way to the first fighting
rank when they come to the front. Such a delay is not, so far as I
can judge, detrimental to success in preparing for the professions.
Eather is the delay a good thing in itelf, for various more or less
indirect reasons which, we need not discuss. But in the case of com-
mercial life the handicap is, I gather, heavily in favor of those who
are early in the field. The luxury of a classical education may prove
costly, either by delaying the acquisition of business methods, or by
causing the novice to hurry over and consequently to scamp the
inevitable routine of business training. Every business is based
upon knowledge of a specialized kind. It may be little more than
bookkeeping, or it may include a considerable acquaintance with vari-
ous branches of geography, science, modern languages, or other sub-
jects. The successful merchant who is fond of asserting that his sons
must begin their work young by ' learning to lick stamps ' is thinking
of the business machine which he has made, and which will continue
to work so long as it is kept well oiled; he is not thinking of new
developments, new competition, new needs for adaptation which will
give fortunes to those who have brains and take them away from mere
office machines. 'Licking stamps' was not the basis and source of
the business methods which he himself developed, although he is fond
of vaunting it as the open sesame of an ever-swelling banking account.
It is a perverse and paradoxical expression of a half-truth; but its
enunciation indicates a stupid incapacity of recognizing the causes
of success in the past, and a still more stupid inability to recognize
the trend of the forces which will make for success in the future.

534 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Already innovations are being made in the training for commercial
life. We shall probably see greater changes in the future. As a
preparation for professional life — a ' training ' in the athletic sense
of the term — the classics hold the field. They develop the muscles
of the mind, without attempting to give specialized skill in their use.
The story of their attainment to this supreme position in education
is a curious one. It is a story of blundering along the right road,
reaching the right goal with the wrong end in view. During the
Eenaissance, men relearned the languages in which the knowledge of
the ancients was enshrined, in order that they might extract their
treasures of science and thought. With this fresh growth of learning,
scholars felt the need of a common language in which to acquire
knowledge and to express the results of their investigations. It was
a necessity in the days of oral teaching and itinerant study. Equipped
with Latin, an English student was equally at home in Cambridge,
Paris or Padua. Frenchmen, Germans, Italians and Spaniards spoke
and wrote in the same language as his teachers at home. Erasmus
might ' learn in Oxford, teach in Cambridge,' correspond with all
the scholars in Europe.

The first generous handfuls of classic wisdom snatched, scholars
joined in a pedantic contest for the crumbs. This search required
accurate knowledge of the languages which encased them. It was im-
possible to pay too much attention to their form. National, or rather
university, rivalry instigated the representatives of learning to acquire
a correct and elegant latinity in which to express their thoughts. It
became traditional that a Scholar (with a capital S) was a man able
to write Ciceronian Latin without the aid of dictionary or books of
accidence ; and this medieval tradition still holds in our public schools.
When one reflects upon the purpose for which so much effort was
originally spent, it is not a little humorous to find the effort continued
for generations after the purpose has ceased to guide it. The results
for which our ancestors strove have long been attained. The thought
of the ancients has long been accessible to every one who can read
English. Their science, which was living to the scholars of the
Eenaissance, is a historic curiosity, interesting merely as a stage in the
progress of the human mind. We can attain all that the Eenaissance
sought for, and an infinity beside, without knowledge of either Greek
or Latin. Yet in the epoch of Winchester rifles we still practise with
flint locks. We stitch samplers in the days of sewing machines.
A Eunic inscription is scarcely more out of date than a Latin oration,
since both are equally things of the past ; both have equally fallen into
disuse. Yet, with all the zeal of the Eenaissance and with an equal
appearance of seriousness, we spend years in preparing our boys to
write Latin orations without the aid of books of reference. The
cache of preserved fruits which the Eenaissance discovered has long

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 535

been consumed. Mental nutriment must now be sought for in the
primal forest, with aid of axe and saw.

I should be very sorry to be misunderstood. It is impossible to
exaggerate the magnitude of the debt which Europe owes to the Italian
scholars of the fourteenth, fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. One needs
to read the story of the rediscovery of the classics, as told by John
Addington Symonds in ' The Eenaissance in Italy,' to understand it
fully. Latin at the beginning of the fourteenth century was so de-
based as to be almost forgotten; Greek was a lost tongue. Petrarch,
Boccaccio and their successors restored Latin and rediscovered Greek.
Dictionaries were compiled; codices compared; no effort was too great,
no detail too petty if it helped to the comprehension of the meaning
of the text or enabled the scholar to amend it when corrupt. It is —
shall we say? — three centuries since this work was substantially com-
plete. It is dangerous to fix a date, seeing that able men at our
various universities are still engaged upon the task; but it can not
be gainsaid that by the beginning of the seventeenth century scholars
were in a position to read Homer and Aristotle, Virgil and Cicero, and
to understand what they read. The seam of gold was exhausted, the
mine had yielded up its hidden wealth; though it may be that for
years to come the ' tailings ' will repay the industrious work of those
who are content with specks.

Yet the pedagogic method of preparing boys for the search remains
the same. And, looking at the matter fairly, we readily acknowledge
that, however empirical, the method is justified by its results. In the
presence of the indisputably satisfactory effects of the method, it
ought not to be difficult to trace the true relation between effects and
cause. How is the success of a classical education to be explained?
Let us decline to admit reasons which, if not absolutely false, are at
any rate half untrue. A boy does not learn Greek and Latin roots
because they will help him to understand his own language. He does
not acquire these languages in order that he may absorb the science
and thought of the ancients direct from the original text. He does
not study Cicero in the expectation of some day writing Latin letters.
For school-boys Greek and Latin are exercises in grammatical ex-
pression, and nothing more.

Among the many disingenuous arguments which have recently
been advanced in favor of the maintenance of the compulsory study
of Greek is the contention that it would be of inestimable value if
properly taught. Its advocates are ready to disown the accumulated
evidence of success, to deny results upon which they might safely rely,
and to advocate a new venture. Greek, they say shutting their eyes
to the teaching of experience, has hitherto been badly taught. It will
answer all expectations if teaching methods are reformed. Too much
attention has been paid to accidence, to scansion, to niceties of gram-

536 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

mar. The subject has been made arid and infertile. Give more
generous treatment a fair chance ! Limit, says one class of apologists,
the work in Greek to Homer and Herodotus. Let the boys do their
translations with open dictionary and grammar. Do not delay so
long over the introduction ; hasten their acquaintance with the Hellenic
heroes; let them come beneath their spell and experience their glamor.
With equal vehemence another school contends, not for Homer and
Herodotus, but for Plato's ' Eepublic ' and the ' Memorabilia ' ; not for
heroics, but for philosophy and art. The teaching of Greek is to have
a new lease of life if it gives pledges that it will turn over a new leaf.
These protestations of its advocates are pure cant. They known that
neither legend, history, philosophy, nor art has influenced the vast
majority of the boys who have thriven on a grammar-school training.
Stultify the grammar, distract attention from accidence, syntax,
prosody, and the value of the gymnastic is reduced to nil. Were it not
for its humorous side, this change of front would be somewhat tragic.
Boys are to be given the most sacred products of Greek thought as
playthings. They are to be encouraged to express their opinion, in
the vernacular of the dormitory, of Plato's metaphysics.

Because in the past such good results have been obtained by giving
boys the shell without the kernel we are asked to believe that we shall
do far better by giving them the kernel without the shell. We decline
to recognize that it was not the nut which nourished them, but the ex-
ercise of cracking it which prepared their jaws for an attack on more
nutritious food. There is no question as to the nourishing properties
of the Greek kernel, but it must take its place with the English kernel
as an article of diet; and there are obvious reasons for serving the
English kernel first.

Do away with grammar — sheer, barren, jejune grammar — and you
sacrifice the discipline which has caused our schools, for centuries after
the purposes of the classical revival were accomplished, to cherish
Greek and Latin as the most efficient instruments of education. We
do not want a reformed teaching of Greek. Its reformation would be
its destruction. Homer's clash of shields may stir a martial spirit.
Plato's spiritualism may satisfy a yearning. But these emotions are
not vehicles of education; they are its burdens. The valor, the phi-
losophy, the poetry, the art of the Greeks contributed little to the
making of the mind of the boy Johnson, the boy Macaulay, the boy
Gladstone — however much these great scholars may have been inspired
by Greek ideals in later life. We have Gladstone's own emphatic testi-
mony that when at Eton he cared nothing at all about the Homeric gods,
nor yet for many a year after he had left. He was at Eton under the
famous flogger, Dr. Keate, at a time when Greek and Latin were the
only subjects in the school curriculum, with " as much divinity as
can be gained from constructing the Greek Testament, and reading

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 537

a portion of Tomline on the Thirty-nine Articles, and a little ancient
and modern geography." A few months after leaving school, he told
Arthur Stanley that " Eton was a very good place for those who
liked boating and Latin verses." It was the painful study of genders
and cases, of dactyls and spondees, which contributed little by little
to the building up of the logic-weaving machine in his brain. Let
any one who can remember his school-boy days try honestly to recall
the sentiments which accompanied the translation of a passage whether
from the commonplace ' Anabasis ' or an incomprehensible chorus.
Let him feel again the emotions which a struggle with the language-
puzzle evoked, and he will, if he can remember those days, find that
the real meaning of the passage interested him not a whit. He was
engaged in the by no means unattractive task of disarticulating a
puzzle covered on one side with Greek characters, and so rearranging
the pieces that when he turned the whole thing over on to its back he
would find that the other side was English.

No argument could be more disingenuous than that of the would-be
reformers who reply to those who, though they recognize the proved
potency of the classics as educational instruments, nevertheless ask
whether other subjects are not available, if not equally good as instru-
ments, yet more prolific of practical results : " Although the classical
vehicles have produced such admirable results, you will be amazed to
find how much more beneficent they are if you substitute for the
vehicles their contents." This is proposing a new venture. It is
embarking upon a new scheme of education, which has neither experi-
ence nor tradition to support it. No rational man doubts the buman
interest of Greek letters; none doubts their moral and aesthetic in-
fluence; yet it may be open to question whether boys would not find
the Arthurian legends as inspiring as the ' Odyssey,' and the plays of
Shakspere as full of wit and precept as Sophocles, JEschyhis and
Euripides. However great the Greek example, there are reasons for
endeavoring to form the character of English boys upon noble types
from nearer home. Besides, the noblest masterpieces of the Greeks
have been nobly translated. In English they will do more for a boy's
mind than the 'Anabasis' will do in Greek. Boys, whatever their
career, must have some literary training, say the apologists for the
present system of teaching classics. This is my contention also, but
I advance it with still greater emphasis. The literary training ob-
tained whilst learning Latin and Greek is indirect, accidental. It is
too serious a part of education to be thus left to chance. The gram-
mar schools did not aim at giving to a boy the capacity of appreciating
the literature of his own land. The old classical training was a drill,
boys were taught to mark time, not to march. Generations of jurists
and men of action have proved that when they left their grammar
schools they were amongst the most vigorous of marchers. No one

533 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

grudged the time spent in practising the goose-step, since there was
no doubt as to the enhanced rate of progress when marching began.
But times are changing. We will not say that competition is increas-
ing— our fathers made the same assertion, and their fathers before
them — but it is spreading. The public-school boy, notwithstanding the
severe discipline of the classics, finds it hard work to hold his own
against boys who have not had the benefit of this drill. Conditions
have recently changed in a remarkable way. It is no longer a com-
petition between boys all of whom have had either a grammar-school
training or none at all. Public elementary schools, higher-grade
schools, county schools, technical institutes are pouring their students
into the upper ranks of the labor market. These students may be
superlatively ignorant of classical grammar, but they have certain
kinds of knowledge and certain forms of dexterity which make them
hard to beat. A very large number of public-school boys are obliged
to find a sphere for their more generalized attainments on the ranches
of North America and the sheep runs of Australia and New Zealand.
If, reluctantly, we abandon the classical drill which has secured our
confidence by three centuries of undeniable success, we must be well
assured that the tactics which we teach in its place are effective in the
modern world.

That the study of language ought to occupy a predominant position
in school life is overwhelmingly proved by grammar-school experience.
I think, too, we must also allow that the fact that the school-boy never
contemplates the classical languages as possible means of communica-
tion is in their favor.

The conclusion which appears to me to be established beyond all
possibility of doubt, both by the positive evidence of the value of a
grammar-school training and by the negative evidence of the difficulty
which attends the acquisition of foreign languages in adult or even
adolescent life, is that training in language is of the essence of educa-
tion in early years. It is of the essence of education in early years
because it is only then that it is effective; and, further, because train-
ing in expression means giving precision to thought. Thinking and
expressing thought in words are so inseparably connected that widen-
ing the range of expression is equivalent to expanding the field of
thought. The benefit of a classical education depends to a large extent
upon the fact that for years a boy's finger is kept between the pages
of a dictionary. He learns new words and comes to feel the importance
of accurate definition. Words are the tesserce of thought. Their
arrangement in patterns is thinking. The mosaic of words shows by
its richness or its poverty, its boldness or its uncertainty, its simplicity
or its confusion and redundancy, the quality of thought. Expressing
is thinking. The schoolmen of the Middle Ages attached so much
importance to dialectic that they came at last to confuse success in the

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 539

game of words with conviction: they looked upon the triumphant ap-
plication of arbitrary rules of logic as proof. They apprehended the
principles of thought; but failed because they mistook their own by-
laws for natural law. The Popes of the Kenaissance, who, like
Eugenius IV., made the only test for high office in the Church an
irreproachable Latin style, were not actuated merely by fashion or
caprice: they mistook rhetorical ability for intellectual power, elo-
quence for wisdom. They were right in the idea, although too zealous
in its application. Eloquence would be wisdom made manifest, if, in
the multitudinous torrent of words, none were used in an ambiguous
sense, none were superfluous, none were capable of replacement by
others more congruous with the thought, none could be displaced from
their position in the phrase without detriment to its sense.

It is not natural to children to make nice distinctions between
approximately equivalent words. It is hardly second nature with
grown men, especially if they be Englishmen. A boy finds that it is
' jolly beastly ' to have to go back to school, and ' beastly jolly ' to be
coming home. He is always struggling back to barbarism — the use of
gesture and stress in place of words. Even grown men have usually
got to get somewhere. They have got to get their hair cut, or have
got to get a book, have got a cold, or have got home. A very few
tesserce serve them to make the pattern of their thoughts, and their
thoughts are in consequence crude and colorless. Children must learn
words and must be drilled in their use. To attribute the proved suc-
cess of classical education to its content appears to me a ludicrous and
even wilful misreading of history ; though I readily admit that even the
average boy acquires something of valor, of patriotism, of esthetic
sensibility, of emotional and intellectual sanity from contact with the
mind of Greeks and Eomans.

My doubt is as to whether, considering the modern conditions of life,
the time has not yet come to replace Greek and Latin by modern and
functional languages; to trust to their masterpieces for material with
which to influence character; and, in the case of children who will
never need to speak or read any language but English, to rely upon
our own Shakspere for words, grammar and emotional tone.

If we but knew the most rudimentary principles of the psychology
of speech ! What form of language is best suited for the expression of
thought ? What form of language is most favorable to thinking ? To
those of us who have been through the ordinary grammar-school train-
ing the highly organized classical languages appear to be indisputably
superior to their maimed and curtailed successors. We feel that gun-
powder has not done more harm to the temples of Athens and Eome
than the barbarians have done to Greek and Latin. We can not resist
the impression that modern Greek and Italian, as they are but the
ruins and vestiges of the languages in which Demosthenes and Cicero

54o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

spoke, afford by comparison but miserable accommodation for thought.
From our extremely small experience of the speech of the world we
judge that, in the case of the few languages which we know, evolution
has proceeded backwards : the better organized, and therefore, from the
evolutionary standpoint, V\s higher, language has given place to the
lower. But we are not justified in this conclusion. Language is
essentially labile. The solvent of thought changes as the quality of
thought changes. Philologists can but speculate as to the stages
through which Greek acquired its complexity. Demosthenes did not
help to regularize a single inflexion. He used the instrument of
expression as it came to his hand. His language is not more, but less,
ornate than that of Homer.

Greek and Latin were not made by cultured Greeks and Eomans.
The languages took form in the converse of their illiterate ancestors.
Literature, upon which the beginnings of culture rest, closes language-
building in the larger sense. Zulu is a more highly flexional language
than Greek, with more elaborate endings, expressive of gender, number,
case, mood, voice; with nicer laws of euphony. Probably the ancestors
of the Greeks were, like the Zulus, a loquacious, quarrelsome, rhetorical
race. The language of the Zulus is not great because it is complex in
form. Every language becomes great when greatly used — Greek from
Demosthenes's mouth; English from Milton's pen. The test of the
elevation of a language, from the evolutionary point of view, is its
simplicity, freedom from ambiguity, correspondence in the order in
which words are used with the sequence in which ideas successively
occupy the focus of consciousness. ' Amdbo, love, future, 1/ is as swift
an expression of thought as ' I shall love ' ; although it does not place
the constituents of the idea in the order in which they pass across
the mirror of my mind; my personality, in the case of such a general
proposition, takes the lead. 'Lucretiam amabo,' no doubt, gives the
order aright. But neither conglomerate allows of the inversion ' Shall
I love ? ' Picking up the school-book nearest to hand, I have essayed
the ' sors Virgiliana.' This is the sentence which my finger touched :
" Kelinquit animus Sextium gravibus acceptis vulneribus " (' De Bello
Gallico/ VI.). It seems to me incredible that this sentence expresses
the thought as it formed itself in Caesar's mind : " Leaves it the soul
Sextius by or to grave by or to received by or to wounds." Surely the
idea of the personality of Sextius preceded the idea of some one
fainting? What purpose is served by three times explaining that it
was by or to (leaving it at the end an open question which) wounds ?
i -ibus/ if it does not impress the mind of the reader as the really
important constituent of the phrase, is unduly heavy for a mere in-
flexion. Caesar did his best with the language which his unlettered
ancestors had bequeathed to him; but he was to be pitied in that his
thoughts when they went abroad must walk in irons.

THE ACQUISITION OF LANGUAGE 541

The only evolutionary tendency in language which we can recog-
nize is this tendency towards analysis, towards dismemberment. So
great an authority as Sir Charles Eliot, vice-chancellor of Sheffield
University, who perhaps knows a greater variety of languages than any
other man, from Portuguese to Eussian, from Turkish to Japanese,
languages of Central Africa and of the Polynesian Islands, tells me
that he considers that this progress favors thought. Gender, number,
case hamper language, restrict its flexibility, impede thought. A mono-
syllabic root-language, such as Chinese or Burmese, is a swifter and
more precise solvent of thought than are the highly inflected Bantu
tongues. If this be true — and it does not seem to me open to doubt —
it is easier to think in English than in Latin.

The drilling of boys in languages of lower type than their own
must have some strange, mysterious sanction to justify its use. There
must be an explanation of the undeniably good results which have
followed this generalized, purposeless training — results which caused
those who were best qualified to judge to cling to it with such tenacity.
It is not of the schools of to-day that I am speaking. So many
reservations and qualifications would be necessary that I could not hope
that my thesis would be approved. The schoolmaster has for some
years been engaged in the process of sloughing his skin — a process
which he seems very reluctant to see accomplished. The rattle at the
end of his tail which so easily subdued the pupils under him has gone.
Yet he still clutches at his gold and purple scales. The lineaments of
Greek gods and Roman orators are still to be distinguished in the folds
of the sadly crumpled case with which he is so unwilling to part. He
feels strangely cold clad in nothing but his native wisdom. It is not
of this half-accomplished rejuvenescence that I wish to speak. Let us
go back to the golden days of grammar schools. It is not as long ago
as Mr. Gladstone's youth. Many of us of a younger generation experi-
enced their heroic rule. Assuredly it was not the content of the classics
which proved in our case of educative value. It could not, for the
reasons I have stated, have been the languages, as such. I have but
one explanation. It was the rebound on to English which the classical
drill produced. We were ceaselessly searching the pages of the dic-
tionary. We were learning new words. We were studying English
syntax. In my opinion any foreign language would have served equally
well to produce this rebound. Or it might have been brought about by
the intelligent paraphrasing, construing, analysis of English authors.
The last course would probably be the shortest road to the supreme
goal — skill in the use of the language in which we think and with
which we speak.

542 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

HYGIENIC EEQUIEEMENTS IN THE PEINTING OF BOOKS

AND PAPEES

By Professor EDMUND B. HUEY

WESTERN UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

r I THE cheapness and universal prevalence of printed matter, and the
-*- general enactment of compulsory education laws which fasten
the reading habit upon all, give the problems of the hygiene of read-
ing a universal and very great significance. This reading habit, when
one thinks of it, has become perhaps the most striking and important
artificial activity to which the human race has ever been molded. A
very considerable part of most people's waking time, whether in child-
hood or in adult life, is taken up with the contemplation of printed
or written rymbols. One is seldom out of sight of some sort of printed
or written matter, and the automatic functioning of the reading habit
keeps one reading away at whatever appears, though it be but the silliest
advertisement in a car or on a concert program.

And yet this reading habit is an intensely artificial performance,
involving for both mind and eye and nervous mechanism, most delicate
of all products of evolution as these are, constant repetitions of func-
tionings which were not foreseen in their evolutionary development.
I discuss elsewhere the nature of these unusual functionings and the
causes of the fatigue and degeneration which have resulted from read-
ing, and which must continue more or less until the organs become
adapted to these requirements of modern civilization. The dangers
from the strain on mind and eye and nerves, in reading, will be ma-
terially lessened if the schools, especially, will honestly enforce certain
hygienic requirements that are now generally agreed upon, and state-
ments of which are easily accessible in such recent books as Shaw's
' School Hygiene/ or in the more comprehensive work of Burgerstein
and Netolitzky.

Probably the most important and most feasible means of lessening
the fatigue and strain of reading is by bringing about, so far as pos-
sible, that all books and papers shall be printed in such type and ar-
rangement as shall fall within certain recognized limits of hygienic
requirement. As to some of the requirements which should be made
of the printer we are still uncertain, and further experimental investi-
gation rather than the present excess of opinion is in order and is
cryingly needed. Of some requirements we can now be certain, and

HYGIENIC REQUIREMENTS IN PRINTING 543

these should be enforced rigorously, in the printing of school-books and
government publications, at least. If enforced here, they will tend to
extend to all printing.

In studying the psychology and pedagogy of reading during some
years past, the writer has been thrown in contact with the experimental
work bearing, upon the establishment of norms for printing. The
present article is an attempt to sum up the results of investigations
made thus far, and to state the requirements which they warrant us
in making of the printer.

The size of the type is perhaps the most important single factor.
The experiments of Griffing and Franz showed that fatigue increases
rapidly as the size of the type decreases, even for sizes above eleven
point, or above a height of 1.5 millimeters for the short letters like v, s,
etc. The various investigators are generally agreed that this should
be made a minimum for the height of the short letters. Matter printed
in this size of type is read faster, and individual words are recognized
more quickly, than where the type is smaller. Besides, Griffing and
Franz found that the effect of insufficient illumination is less marked
with the larger type. Preferably the height of the small letter should
be somewhat above the minimum stated, though when the height is
much above two millimeters Weber's experiments indicated that the
speed of reading is decreased.

The thickness of the vertical strokes of the letters should not be
less than .25 millimeter, according to Cohn, preferably .3 millimeters,
according to Sack. This thickness of the letters has been found by
Javal and others to be a very important factor in increasing legibility
and thus in decreasing fatigue. Griffing and Franz found, however,
that hair lines might form parts of the letter without decreasing the
legibility provided the other parts were thick. They find it possible,
however, that such hair lines may increase fatigue. The minimum of
thickness stated above should be insisted on for the main lines.

The space within the letters, between the vertical strokes, should
not be less than .3 millimeter, according to most investigators. Sack
finds .5 millimeter to be preferable. There is probably little to be
gained by increasing the distance between the letters beyond that which
is usual in the better printed books of the present time. Burger-
stein and Netolitsky would require that this distance should be greater
than the distance between two c neighboring ground strokes ' of a
letter, and Sack would make the minimum distance .5 to .75 millimeter.
Burgerstein and Netolitzky would not allow more than six or seven
letters per running centimeter, and would require as much as two
millimeters between words. With these requirements Sack is in
agreement. It should be remembered that any very unusual
separation of the letters of a word is distracting and should
be avoided.

544 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

These minimal forms as stated by Burgerstein and Netolitzky
should be made requirements, except that possibly the distance between
letters is not so important as they urge. The minimum of six or seven
letters per running centimeter is a convenient approximate gauge which
can be quickly applied and is not too stringent.

Griffing and Franz found that legibility increased somewhat, though
not greatly, with increase in the distance between the lines, with the
leading, as it is called. Cohn thinks it important that there should be
a minimum interlignage of 2.5 millimeters, and Sack requires the same.
Javal does not find that interlignage increases legibility appreciably,
and thinks that the space used for interlignage had far better be
given to an increased size of letter without interlignage. The leading
is doubtless a mistake when the size of type is below the requirements
made above. The size of type should by all means be increased instead,
as this is by far the most important of the factors conditioning fatigue.
However, a certain amount of leading should be required in school
books, at least, but hardly more than Cohn's minimum of 2.5 milli-
meters.

As to length of lines there is a general consensus in favor of the
shorter as against the longer lines, with a tendency to favor 90 milli-
meters as a maximum, some placing the maximum at 100 millimeters.
The latter is doubtless too high. Javal, who has studied the matter
very carefully, insists that the maximum should be considerably below
even 90 millimeters. He names as one of the principal causes of
fatigue in reading, and as a cause tending to produce and aggravate
myopia, the considerable amount of asymmetrical accommodation re-
quired as the eye moves along a long line, the amount increasing always
with the length of the line. Even with the page squarely before the
reader, unless he makes constant and fatiguing movements of the
head while reading, the reading matter is always farther from one
eye than from the other, except at a middle point, and the reader
strains to accommodate for both distances, especially for objects held
so near as is the page in reading.

Against the long lines is also to be urged the difficulty and dis-
traction incident to finding the place at each turn to the next line,
increasing always as the lines are longer. Besides, the longer lines
require a greater extent of eye-movement for a given amount of read-
ing. This comes from the fact, verified by various experimenters, that
the eye does not traverse the whole line in reading, but begins within
the line and usually makes its last pause still farther within, reading
the first and last parts of the line in indirect vision. The amount of
this indentation tends to be a constant amount irrespective of the
line's length, and is consequently a larger proportion of the line's
length in the shorter lines. There is thus an important lessening of

HYGIENIC REQUIREMENTS IN PRINTING 545

eye-work in using the shorter lines. Indeed, I found that readers
could read matter printed in lines of 25 millimeters in one downward
sweep without any lateral movement of the eyes. With lines 30
millimeters long, the lateral movement was sometimes almost nil, and
seemed to be due mainly to habit. In reading such lines in this
way the eye's extent of movement is hardly more than one fourth
or one fifth the amount needed for the same matter when printed in
long lines.

When the shorter lines, generally, more words were read per fixation
than with the longer ones. A magazine column having lines 60.5
millimeters long was in one case read at the rate of 3.63 words per
fixation, while columns having lines 98 to 121 millimeters long required
a fixation for every two words. Lines of a length approximating 60
millimeters are usual in newspapers and in my experiments were read
with a minimum of eye-movement. The makers of the modern news-
paper have felt the reaction of readers more, perhaps, than have the
makers of books. Out of this experience has evolved the present prac-
tise of printing newspapers in narrow columns, the line-lengths of
which are perhaps as near the optimum as can be determined at present,
when we consider that much shorter lines give great inconvenience to
the printer.

For books, also, the newspaper line-length is near an optimum so far
as ease and speed of reading are the conditions to be considered. In
the case of large books where the question becomes one of printing in
one or in two columns per page the latter alternative should un-
doubtedly be chosen. For books of ordinary sizes a somewhat longer
line may be used where this will contribute to convenience or beauty;
but a book should not be used whose lines are more than 90 millimeters
in length, and somewhat shorter lines are generally to be preferred.

One of the great advantages of the shorter lines is that they con-
stantly permit the reader to see in indirect vision what his eye has
just passed as well as what is just coming. Though the words of this
related matter may not be clearly perceived, they furnish visual clues
which keep the reading range further extended at each moment, a
most desirable condition for all reading and especially for fast reading
or for skimming. With such lines a hurried reader may glance
straight down a page with only an occasional short stop, and may yet
be sure that he has gathered the gist of everything.

Dr. Dearborn, in experiments made recently at Columbia Univer-
sity, found that the eye makes its longest pause near the beginning of
the line, thus permitting a general preliminary survey of the line.
A secondary pause of more than average duration is made near the
end of the line, perhaps partially in review. He finds that lines of
only moderate length facilitate these general surveys better than the

VOL. LXX. — 35.

546 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

longer lines, and finds also that they facilitate a rhythmical regularity
of eye-movement, both being conditions which contribute to speed
and ease of reading. His tests showed that such lines (a little longer
than newspaper lines) were read at greater speed and with shorter
pauses than lines of twice the length.

Dearborn argues, and correctly I think, in favor of uniformity in
the length of lines, particularly in books for children. The reader
drops quickly into a habit of making a regular number of movements
and pauses per line, for a given passage, and broken lines confuse and
prevent the formation of such habits. However, a slight indentation
every other line may, he thinks, be of distinct advantage.

Dearborn thinks that a line of 75-85 millimeters combines a good
many advantages, and we are certainly safe in putting 90 millimeters
as a maximum, with a preference for lines of 60 to 80 millimeters.

The smaller books which can be easily held in the hand during
the reading are to be preferred, and on the whole have grown in
popular favor. The larger books usually have to lie on a support,
which exposes the letters at an angle, greatly lessening their legibility
and producing the equivalent of a material decrease in the size of type.
As to the forms of particular letters, many changes are cryingly
needed. However, further investigation is needed before we are war-
ranted in requiring changes of the printer. We know that such letters
as t, z, o, s, e, c, i, are comparatively illegible. C, e, and o are often
confused with each other, and i with 1, h with k, etc. This confusion
can be avoided by making certain changes in these letters, and their
legibility can be increased. Certain excellent recommendations of
changes in particular letters have been made by Javal, Cohn, Sanford,
and others.

However, there are many things to be considered in making such
changes, and further thorough and mature investigation is needed
before any letter is permanently changed. The whole matter should
be placed in the hands of a competent specialist or committee of spe-
cialists, to be worked over experimentally and advised upon in the
light of the psychology of reading, the history of typography, esthetic
considerations, the convenience of printing, and the lessons of experi-
ence generally. Changes should not be made on the single basis of
experiments upon the comparative legibility of isolated letter-forms.
A letter whose legibility in isolation is bad may sometimes contribute
most to the legibility of the total word-form. Studies now being
made of the comparative legibility of letters as seen in context will-
doubtless throw light on this point. The subject is too complex to
permit the adoption of recommendations that are based on study, how-
ever careful, of any single aspect, or on anything that does not include
a careful study of all the factors. It is high time, however, that there

HYGIENIC REQUIREMENTS IN PRINTING 547

should be a rationalization of these printed letter-forms that have come
down to us in such a happy-go-lucky fashion, and it is to be hoped that
either the Carnegie Institution or some department of research in a
well-equipped university may take hold of the matter and see that the
work is thoroughly done.

Among further printing requirements that are important and that
should be insisted on, the letters should have sharp clear-cut outlines,
and should be deep black. The paper should be pure white, but with-
out gloss, the latter being especially trying to the eyes. According to
Cohn and Sack the paper should have a minimum thickness of .075
millimeter. Paper of a slightly yellowish tinge is probably not in-
jurious and is preferred by Javal. But in general the legibility de-
pends on the contrast between the black of the printed forms and the
white of their back-ground, and colored or gray papers lessen this
difference and thus diminish legibility. Pure white light gives the
greatest legibility. The print of one side must not show through from
the other, and the printing must be so done that it will not affect the
evenness of surface of the other side.

It is important that wall charts and maps should not contain more
names than are absolutely necessary for purposes of instruction, and
that these should be in large clear type; or the most important names
for reference at a distance and by classes may be in the large type,
with the others in type fulfilling the requirements for school-books and
for use by individuals at the ordinary reading distance from the
chart or map. Burgerstein and Netolitzky advise that school maps
should not present the physical and political features on the same
map, in the interest of greater legibility. Names printed on colored
map surfaces need to be in larger rather than in smaller type than
that used in books, if legibility is to be maintained, as any other
back-ground than white means diminished legibility.

The writing upon slates is considerably less legible than that upon
good white paper. In the case of blackboards the surface is apt to
be gray after erasing, and this, of course, lessens the legibility very
considerably. It is important that the blackboard surface be deep
black, without gloss from reflection so far as this is possible; and that
it be kept clean, avoiding the gray effect. Teachers and pupils should
acquire the habit of writing on the blackboard in a large plain hand,
as the greater distance at which the writing is read and the usually
diminished legibility makes this of importance, and especially in the
primary school grades.

In stating the requirements above, I have had in mind the needs
of adult readers and of the older school children. The younger chil-
dren must have a type much larger than the minima there stated.
The reading of young children has not been sufficiently studied to

548 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

warrant a final statement of what should be required in the printing of
their books. As the most usable approximate statement of what may
properly be insisted on, and for the sake of uniformity, I quote here
the requirements made by Shaw in his ' School Hygiene.' These
requirements are none too stringent, except that sometimes some of
the leading may well be sacrificed in favor of a type that is a little
larger, for the third and forth grades especially.

" For the first year the size of the type should be at least 2.6 milli-
meters and the width of leading 4.5 mm."

" For the second and the third year, the letters should not be smaller
than 2 mm. with a leading of 4 mm."

" For the fourth year the letters should be at least 1.8 mm. with
leading 3.6 mm."

For some grades succeeding this the type should be kept well above
the minimal requirements for adult readers.

Examinations of the school books in use in Germany, Eussia, and
other European countries, made at various times and places, have shown
that usually from fifty to eighty-five per cent, of the books came short
of hygienic requirements. American books are somewhat better, but
include very many that are very bad. Even when the principal part
of the book is in good type, there will often be large sections printed
in a type so small as to be very injurious. The dictionaries and other
books of reference have notoriously small print, and those with the
smaller and poorer types should be mercilessly discriminated against.
As Shaw rightly says, " Principals, teachers, and school superintendents
should possess a millimeter measure and a magnifying glass and should
subject every book presented for their examination to a test to deter-
mine whether the size of the letters and the width of the leading are
of such dimensions as will not prove injurious to the eyes of children.
If every book, no matter what its merits, were rejected if its type were
"too small, the makers of such books would very quickly bring out new
•editions with a proper size of type."

TEE WASTE OF CEILDREN 549

THE WASTE OF CHILDEEN

By Dr. Geo. B. MANGOLD

UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

LESS than two hundred years ago not more than one fourth of
the children born in London ever reached their fifth year of life.
The rest were ruthlessly swept aside and died without adding a single
iota to the sum of human service. It is a matter of utmost importance
to know under what conditions an advance in population is secured.
The beginnings of national life in Europe were accompanied by
energetic efforts to augment the number of each national group. Neces-
sarily the strength of a nation depended largely upon the size of its
population. Despite these efforts, the practical results were lost in
the many adverse circumstances which operated to neutralize their
effects. A comparatively slow increase of the population of nearly
every European country before the last quarter of the eighteenth cen-
tury was the natural result. Every civilization, however, whether old
or new, has purchased progress at considerable cost. Lives, property
and happiness have been sacrificed to attain this coveted goal. Civil-
ization spells economy. It means a fuller utilization of our powers,
faculties, and our mental and physical equipment, no less than a more
capable use of the productive forces of nature. The more primitive
a society, the more immediate and absolute is its subjection to environ-
ment. From this thraldom civilization is gradually releasing us, and
to-day we stand partly above our environment and in a measure mold
it by determining its character, and forcing its adaptation to our
peculiarities in addition to our own increasing adaptability to its
changing conditions.

Probably in no other field of human activity has man's former
ignorance been more lamentable in its consequences than in that of
rearing children — the future parents of the race. Even the slow in-
crease of savage tribes is purchased at a tremendous expenditure of
energy, and the number of infants and little children whose physical
and economic cost is never compensated for by useful and productive
lives has been appalling. A recent investigation of the Bontoc Igorrote
in the Philippines indicates a mortality of 60 per cent, before the age
of puberty is reached. Such people have risen but little above their
natural environment and are quite subject to its rigors and destroying
processes. Decreasing cost characterizes advancing civilization, yet
throughout the eighteenth century the European population, being

550 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

largely ignorant or indifferent, was blighted by the influence of a de-
stroying environment.

The progress of the industrial world for the last century has been un-
paralleled and almost incredible. The organization of industry, the rise
of combinations, the fuller utilization of the forces of nature, our
marvelous inventions, the increasing division of labor and greater in-
sistence upon bodily vigor are devices calculated to lessen the cost of
production of goods. In certain industries, for example the oil and
packing industries, such a state of ^perfection has been reached that
little if any waste products remain, although twenty years ago a large
residue was continually lost. The decrease of unnecessary cost and
labor is the goal of industry. Apply this principle to the cost of
propagating the human race and what do we find ? Is not the tax and
strain upon the expectant mother too great to permit even an apathetic
society calmly to ignore the just claims of dying infants for the op-
portunities which make for a life of usefulness and service? The
eighteenth century began to answer this question, but even the twentieth
has not yet given a satisfactory reply. The darkness and austerity of
a civilization finds no mean measure in its infant death rate. In this
respect great progress has indeed been made, but it is an advance far
outstripped by the progress of industry. Social progress has proved
the laggard, but may yet make amends for past neglect.

The wholesome changes of the past one hundred and fifty years
are indications of great possibilities. The conditions in London only
reflected those existing throughout all England which lived beneath
the pall of the blighting destroyer of babes. In recent years three
fourths of the children in London have lived to the age of five. As
late as 1761, however, 50 per cent, of London's population perished
before reaching the age of twenty. To-day half the people of England
do not die until after the fifty-fourth year has been reached, and the
infant mortality — the death rate for children under one year of age
— had fallen in 1903 to the creditable figure of 144 per 1,000 births for
the seventy-six great towns of England. Even this rate is somewhat
above the average for the entire country. In Prussia during the
decade 1751 to 1760 only 312 children out of every 1,000 births sur-
vived to the age of ten. At this age the child is still an economic cost;
it depends upon others and yields no surplus to society. Yet two
thirds of the entire population failed to reach an age of social useful-
ness, and perished after body, mind and resource had been spent to
give it a proper place in human society. The record of a later decade,
1861-70, shines in comparison with the former, but is still fraught
with fears for the future. Six hundred and thirty-three individuals
were being saved out of every 1,000 — a promising decline, but one not
measuring up to the hopes of social amelioration. Is it any wonder
that former mothers, full of grief and anguish at the sight of lifeless

TEE WASTE OF CHILDREN 55 *

babes, believed more largely in a Providence whose decree was in-
exorable, who gave and who took away ? From this morbid fatalism the
medical advance of the past one hundred years and the strenuous efforts
of men with human sympathies applying themselves to problems of
social betterment have freed the majority of our kind, and the doctrine
is properly relegated to the category of abandoned beliefs. The triumph
over small-pox has been one of the results contributing to this end.
Formerly it was a scourge carrying away large portions of the popula-
tion. Two thirds of all new-born children are said to have been at-
tacked, of whom one eighth or more regularly died. A frightful
mortality thus obtained, and this was minimized only through the in-
troduction of vaccination, which in some countries increased the
average duration of life as much as three and one half years. Owing
to this direful experience of the past, foreign countries are still more
insistent than we are upon employing that method of preventing the
disease.

France has paralleled the record of England, and, when once
inaugurated, improvements and reforms succeeded with astonishing
rapidity. During the first seven years of the last century, the num-
ber of male inhabitants reaching an age sufficient to subject them to
conscription was but 45 per cent, of the total number born, yet by
1825 the percentage had risen to 61 — a most healthful gain in the
proportion of those attaining adult life. Backward Eussia has been
equally a laggard in its attention to the moral and social require-
ments winch result in a low infantile death rate. At the beginning
of the nineteenth century it permitted one third only of the children
of its peasants to grow up to maturity and as few as 36 per cent, of
its population reached the age of twenty years. Even here science has
made advance.

The great changes in the social and economic conditions of the
European people have had a marked effect upon the growth of the
population. As the power and ability of men to control the conditions
of their environment were increasingly realized, beneficent effects were
everywhere noticeable. To recuperate the strength lost in war and
disaster, men urged the device of a decreased death rate instead of
striving as formerly for a larger percentage of births. An observing
demographer in the first half of the last century thus expressed himself,
' Population does not so much increase because more are born as be-
cause fewer die/ Yet the population of nearly every country has
increased wonderfully during the past century, and in view of the
new conditions of its expansion what a fine commentary upon the
advance of modern civilization and the practical efficiency of govern-
ment this tremendous fact has been !

From this former dismal reality with its merciless slaughter of
helpless babes we in America have made much progress. Accurate

S52 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

data for the earlier years of our history are wanting, and at present
very few of our states keep a careful registration of births and deaths,
although a large number of our cities are now recording their vital
statistics with increasing care. The absence of city life with its bane-
ful consequences somewhat relieves us from the charge of infanticide,
but the exposure and the rigors of the Atlantic seaboard worked its
many hardships. Data for New York before 1850 show that 27 per
cent, of its infants died before reaching the age of one, but the rate
for Boston was comparatively low, being recorded as less than 20 per
cent. — a figure exceeded by many cities at the present time. Condi-
tions in Massachusetts have been relatively favorable and its vital
statistics indicate that the death-dealing influences of the close of the
century were more fatal than those operating at the beginning of the
Civil War. This observation, discouraging as it is, is somewhat soft-
ened by the favorable changes in the death rate of children below the
age of five. These records prove that a constantly growing percentage
of children live to that age, and once having reached the fifth year the
chance of a life of future usefulness is considerably increased. The
expectation of life in Boston according to the reports of the Census
Bureau was in 1900, 9.74 years greater for the child of five than for
the infant at birth. This difference is, moreover, diminishing, as it
certainly must if mortality is being checked. A similar difference in
the English expectation of life argues for similar rates of mortality
for children at these ages. The low death rate of children between
the ages of five and fourteen insures the succession of a large majority
to an adult age. Civilization demands that this be a constantly in-
creasing proportion and that the fewest possible number of lives be
wrecked in the adolescent stage. The energies of society must be
expended in many various directions where the need is most urgent,
and where reforms are clearly possible. That society should waste
vast portions of its accumulating energies is not only deplorable and
a hindrance to social advance, but is a mark of criminal neglect.
Where waste of lives can be avoided, as the decreasing mortality of
children shows, there inaction by society is unpardonable.

In spite of the existence of many plague spots, where innocent
infants are barbarously slain, the statistics set forth by the twelfth
census furnish ground for a growing optimism. Although a large
percentage of inaccuracy obtains, the figures are sufficiently reliable
and comparable to indicate quite faithfully the hopeful tendency
toward child saving. The tables for the registration area show that
the infantile death rate fell from 205 per 1,000 births in 1890 to 165
in 1900. In the former year one out of every five infants died,
although allowance should be made for unrecorded births. In the
latter year one out of every six — a gain of approximately 20 per cent.
For children under five the gain is even more favorable, thus demon-

THE WASTE OF CHILDREN 553

strating an increasing success in bringing children through the most
critical stages of life and in lessening the necessary waste. The thou-
sands who die are not the victims of the law of natural selection. It
is not largely an elimination of the unfit. More definitely than ever
before is it being established that most children enter life with an
endowment of native vitality sufficient to weather the ordinary condi-
tions of adversity. The great variations in death rates after the first
few months are due largely to postnatal influences, to the social and
economic environment in which the child is caught, from which it
has no appeal, and which make or mar its future.

The wide range of infant mortality from the lowest rates of the
healthful country districts to the fearful massacre of infants in the
crowded and unsanitary portions of our larger cities indicates the
magnitude of the task still before us. That eminent authority on vital
statistics — Dr. Farr — estimated that the annual unnecessarv deaths
of infants in England during the decade 1851-60 numbered more than
64,000. The conditions in respect to food, water, cleanliness, mal-
nutrition and midwifery, he regarded as the chief causes of this need-
less loss of life. The proportion of loss suffered from these sources
has since undoubtedly diminished, but the aggregate number is greater
now than then. The effect of the various factors which influence the
rate of our annual loss of children is marked in the difference between
our urban and rural rates, and between those of white and colored
children. The comparative healthfulness of rural life is attested to
by ample evidence. It is indicated not only by the farmer's long
expectation of life, but also by the low death rate prevailing among
his children. A comparison of the chances of the child in the country
and in the city is a proof of the wholesome influence of a favorable
environment. It suggests the need of increasing effort to raise the
city to the high level of rural vitalit3r. In the registration states the
infant mortality for white children varied in 1900 from an average of
116 per 1,000 births in the rural districts to 180 in the cities. The
urban rate seems to be more than 50 per cent, higher than that ob-
served among the country population. For every two infants dying
in the country, three are sacrificed in the city districts. Yet this is
not everywhere the case, nor is it necessarily so. In parts of Germany
the rural death rate is enormous. Especially is this true in the agri-
cultural districts of southern Bavaria, where an almost hopeless infant
mortality is recorded. The rural region of Prussia shows higher rates
than do our American cities, but they still possess a slight advantage
over Prussian urban centers. This heavy mortality indicates a social
lethargy and backward conditions among the agricultural population,
which in spite of many natural sanitary advantages remains handi-
capped by unfavorable social and industrial surroundings; and these
preclude proper attention to the wants of children. In England,

554 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

again, the rural rate is generally below that of the cities and consider-
ably below the infant mortality of the mining and industrial centers.
Compared with Scotland, the entire country has a decided disadvantage.
Yet the nature of the problem is somewhat simplified on reflection
that the results of an earlier investigation of death rates disclosed the
fact that the mortality of the sons of peers before the age of six was
less than one third of that obtaining among the rest of the population.
On the other hand, many English and American cities record rates
lower than the average rate prevailing in the rural district — an
eloquent argument for the possibilities of many of our cities. The,
statistics of 1881-90 for Massachusetts showed average variations dur-
ing the decade from 111 to 239 deaths per 1,000 births. The former
rate marked the healthfulness of a residential town, the latter portrays
the conditions existing in an industrial center. Yet in some of the
manufacturing towns where no tenement-house evil existed the infantile
death rate was comparatively low. Other American cities show varia-
tions equally wide, and even within the same city the most contrasting
conditions continue to exist. The lowest rates for cities of considerable
size are recorded for Seattle, St. Paul and Minneapolis. The pre-
vailing rates are approximately 100 deaths per 1,000 births, according
to their records, which some authorities have, ho.wever, pronounced as
giving too favorable a showing. Many of the larger cities double the
death rate for infants, while in numerous southern cities it rises to
almost criminal proportions. John Spargo has pointed out the dif-
ferences that may exist within a single city and exemplifies them by
quoting a rate of 94.4 per 1,000 in the Back Bay district of Boston
against a proportion of 252.1 for one of its poorer districts. Some
of our own cities have clearly blazed the path of progress. Buffalo
and Bochester, N. Y., have during the decade 1890-1900 made notable
reductions in the percentage of loss from infant mortality. Better
inspection of the milk supply and increased watchfulness of contagious
diseases, especially those of children, have contributed to this end. In
Buffalo compulsory vaccination of school children was instituted and
circulars distributed which contained instructions concerning the care
of children. Among cities which have done noble service during the
same decade in reducing the mortality of children under five are Lowell,
Lawrence and Haverhill, Mass., Newark and Jersey City. All these
had high rates of mortality and present rates still exceed those of
many of our cities in which conditions are naturally more favorable.
The many remarkable ameliorative changes of the past fifteen years
only indicate the possibilities whose limits have not yet been reached,
while much pioneer work still remains to be done. In view of the
declining rates and the wide variations in them, the existing differences
refuse to be explained away, and we can not assign them all to natural
causes. Some cities, especially those of the Pacific coast and the moun-

TEE WASTE OF CEILDREN 555

tains, possess natural advantages, yet cities under similar conditions
show most striking contrasts. Still worse, the same city may con-
tain the extremes of progress and of neglect. Hence our efforts can
not be abated until they have wrested from the destroyer every vestige
of his ill-gotten power. It is the province of science and the duty of
society to force from nature what she can not rightfully claim, and to
leave her the remainder only. Serious changes in our methods and
policies may be involved, but these must be molded according to this
undying purpose. The miserable conditions still prevailing among
the American negroes are evidence of this need. An infant mortality
in Charleston where the majority are negroes, of 419 per 1,000,
and in other southern cities of more than 300 is little better than
barbarism. At first thought the racial factor might be assigned as
the cause of this great difference between the vitality of white and
colored infants, but this defence of social inaction is unworthy of
our race. A closer investigation shows that the death rate in the
rural portion of the registration area was 218.9 for colored infants,
but that the city rate stood at 387. This difference roughly meas-
ures the advantages of a more favorable social environment. Were
the care of the children a more capable one and the conditions making
for degradation and disordered birth rate ameliorated, this wide dif-
ference would not exist, and the rates in the rural districts could be
further reduced. Eemembering the former pitiless slaughter of
white infants, our hopes for the negro need not be abated. Indeed the
colored infant mortality of the rural districts in 1900 was but little
above that of white infants for the entire registration area in 1890.
What hopes then might not knowledge and prosperity offer! Three
eighths of the negro infants of the cities dying annually! To their
mothers they are nothing but a curse, a cause of pain and sorrow. A
cross-section of a darker age resides in our midst. Yet 150 years ago
the children of our ancestors died with an equal facility.

Climate and certain phases of nature have so far proved impregna-
ble to the genius of our race. Their disadvantages may have to be
borne for years and centuries, but for acclimated peoples an infant
death rate of 307 per 1,000, as was recorded for the Philippines for
1903, is only an evidence of an inferior and brutal civilization. To
counteract such death rates and provide for a liberal increase of popu-
lation a birth rate must be excessive if not inhuman.

These facts disclose a cause of the rapid increase of population dur-
ing the last century. The increased vitality of infants has made it
possible. With their rate of mortality cut in two a new era might
naturally arise. The English birth rate was higher in 1851 than in
1891, but the percentage of excess of births over deaths was greater
in the latter year. The fluctuations between these two dates indicate
the highest net increase as occurring during the decade 1871-80, but

556 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

the significant lesson taught is seen in the possibilities which even a
lower birth rate may yield. The continued triumph of knowledge
and humaneness draws comfort from the recent history of other Euro-
pean nations. A comparison of birth rates, death rates and excess of
births between the period 1861-80 and 1885-96 shows that in nearly
every important European country birth rates have declined. Yet
no alarming tendency to depopulation has manifested itself, because
the decreasing death rates permit a greater net increase of lives. Con-
sequently the rate of increase was augmented during this period in
Hungary, Prussia, Austria, Italy, Holland and Belgium, but declined
slightly in England, France and Scandinavia. Some of these nations
have a mortality which is even now considered excessive and which,
if proper measures are inaugurated, can be considerably reduced. Hun-
gary with a birth rate in recent years of 40.4 had a smaller percentage
of increase than Sweden whose rate was only 27.1, while the Russian
mortality was higher than England's birth rate and but little below
that of Germany.

Several observations may be made in respect to the foregoing facts :

First and foremost: The physiological advantage of contributing
to a growing population by means of lowering the death rate rather
than by increasing the rate of birth. Mental anguish, physical and
economic cost, would thus be reduced to a minimum. It is the method
of enlightened civilization. The burden of our mothers is not lightly
borne, let them enjoy the fruits of their suffering.

Second : The marvelous reduction in the former rate of infant
mortality indicates what social reform may accomplish, and what a
saving of lives may follow.

Third: The differences between rural and urban death rates sug-
gest the character of the environment needed for the increased health-
fulness of cities.

Fourth: The contrasting conditions disclosed in single American
cities and the gratifying results of sanitary measures, milk inspection,
and advancing intelligence pave the way for a growing hopefulness.

Realizing the importance of the principles which our vital statistics
establish, society can insist more strenuously upon preventive reforms.
It can reduce the waste of infant lives, and conserve our potential
population. Let us ascertain whether our population is sufficiently
fecund by giving every new-born babe a fair opportunity for life.
Whether ' race suicide ' will then have a national aspect, society will
be better able to judge. Certain classes are indeed chargeable with a
low birth rate, but for the masses the more important problem is a
diminishing infant mortality. When the best of society's efforts in
this direction have been realized, then a solid basis for subsequent
reasoning concerning the probable future of our race will have been
established.

A BLAZING BEACH 557

A BLAZING BEACH

BY d. P. PENHALLOW, D.Sc, f.r.s.c.

MACDONALD PROFESSOR OF BOTANY, MCGILL UNIVERSITY

TN December, 1905, an account was given in Science1 of a remark-
-*- able phenomenon which was described as ' A Blazing Beach ' as
observed at Kittery Point, Maine, and an attempt was then made to
bring forward an explanation which would satisfactorily account for
all the observed facts. During the past summer an opportunity was
offered for a reexamination of the locality, and it was then possible
to obtain some additional facts which tend to strengthen the conclu-
sions originally reached. It was also learned that a second but smaller
conflagration had occurred in the same place at a somewhat later date.
It is therefore felt that a further account of the facts will be of inter-
est at this time.

The accompanying photograph, taken during the past summer,
shows the precise area within which the conflagration developed. The
beach at the point where the fire occurred is composed of a barrier
ridge at its upper margin, made up of pebbles of varying sizes. This
ridge is thrown up and maintained under the action of southeast
storms, at the angle of repose for the material of which it is composed,
and about half-way down its outer face, the high water mark of spring
tides is clearly indicated by patches of sea-weed. This high-water
mark corresponds approximately to the level of the interior area where
the trees are to be seen growing, and which is frequently flooded in
times of severe southeasterly storms. The base of the barrier ridge
is indicated by the line of sea-weed which defines the high-water mark
of the ordinary neap tides. From this point the beach, consisting of
pebbles, continues outward and downward at a somewhat sharp incline
for a distance of about seventy-five feet, when the pebbles are replaced
by sand, the first patch of which is seen just above the line of water.
The photograph shows half-tide.

The sand formation extends from the edge of the water outward
with a very gentle slope, and thus makes shoal water for a considerable
distance beyond the mass of loose rock seen on the extreme left. With
the exception of the barrier ridge, the beach extends laterally for a
distance of one hundred and seventy-five to two hundred feet between
the solid ledges shown in the photograph. The general constitution
of the shore along the river front is solid ledge, and this particu-
lar locality may be described as a pocket which has become filled with

*N. S., Vol. XXII., pp. 794-796. 1905.

558 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

sedimentary deposits consisting of clay, sand, sand and gravel, coarse
gravel and finally large pebbles.

Over the outer portion of the sandy bottom, also for great dis-
tances beyond, as well as up and down the river wherever extensive
silting has developed the formation of muddy bottoms, there is an
abundant growth of eel grass (Zostera marina) which, together with
other debris of a similar nature, is continually washed upon the beach,
broken up by the combined action of the waves and sand and gradually
buried in the latter, so that each year the deposit of organic matter
is increased by definite though rather slight increments.

From these data it will be observed that some special significance
attaches to the fact that the fire, on two separate occasions, was strictly
confined to the beach, and that it did not in any way extend over the
limiting areas of rock.

On the evening of Friday, September 1, 1905, the guests in the
hotel, the piazza of which may be seen on the extreme right of the
photograph, were startled by the appearance of flames rising from the
beach and also from the surface of the water. The tide was about one
hour lower than shown in the photograph, so that a very considerable
portion of the sand was uncovered. The conflagration occurred be-
tween seven and eight o'clock in the evening and lasted for upwards
of forty-five minutes. It was accompanied by a loud and continuous
crackling noise, which could be distinctly heard one hundred yards
distant, due to the rapidly recurring explosion of bubbles of gas as
they came to the surface of the sand or water. At the, same time there
was a very strong liberation of sulphurous acid gas, which penetrated
the hotel, drove the proprietor and his staff from the office and filled
the other rooms to such an extent as to cause great inconvenience to
the guests. So great a heat was developed that the sand could not be
held in the hands, while sand placed in a tumbler with water and then
stirred, liberated bubbles of gas which ignited upon coming in contact
with the air. On this occasion the fire developed over that portion of
the sand which had been exposed by the falling tide, and it also ex-
tended out over the water for a distance of thirty or forty feet.

On the evening of Wednesday, October 4, 1905, as reported by a
reliable observer, the phenomenon was repeated with identical features,
except that instead of occupying the entire area between the rock for-
mation on each side, it was restricted to the area where the two boats
are lying. It therefore occupied probably less than one fourth the
area of the first conflagration.

It is difficult to estimate the height of the flames on these two occa-
sions, since the conditions under which the fire occurred would tend
to give an exaggerated value. It is probable that in general the flames
were not more than three or four inches in height, and this would
be a reasonable estimate when arising from small bubbles of gas.
But, as stated in the original account, the flames attained a maximum

A BLAZING BEACH 559

of about one foot, and this may readily be conceived of as possible in
cases where there was an unusual discharge of gas.

The explanation originally offered appears to fulfill all the observed
conditions, and upon further study there seems to be no good reason
for regarding it as other than valid. The flames are to be considered
as resulting directly from the spontaneous combustion of light carbu-
retted and phosphuretted hydrogen at the moment of their contact with
the air, and these flaming gases in turn ignited the associated sulphur-
etted hydrogen, which gas then gave rise to secondary features such
as the bluish, luminous flame and the sulphurous acid fumes. Exam-
ination showed that there was no adequate basis for any of the various
attempts to explain the phenomenon as the result of volcanic action,
the disruptive effects of a blast of fifty tons of dynamite two miles
away, or the decomposition of fish, the phosphorescence of which was
not clearly differentiated from the main features of the conflagration.

While it is a comparatively simple matter to reach the conclusions
thus far given, it is altogether a more serious problem to ascertain the
origin of the gas, the greatest difficulty being to determine how gas
could be produced in sufficient quantity to give rise to a conflagration
of the extent and duration observed. It is perhaps justifiable to con-
clude that the gas must have been accumulating at a slow rate for a
long time, otherwise there would not have been such a large volume;
and it is also reasonable to suppose that, unless liberated as fast aa
formed, smaller conflagrations should have been noted on previous
occasions. But the local records, so far as the memory of ' the oldest
inhabitant' extends, can show no similar occurrence in the past.
Such storage of gas would be quite possible in a deposit of coarse
gravel, pebbles and coarse sand, overlaid by a layer of fine, wet and
compact sand acting as a retaining layer. It is possible, also, that
the accumulation of gas may have been brought about under slight
pressure, so that the earthquake of the day before may have furnished
just that shaking which was necessary to disturb the conditions of
equilibrium and liberate the gas at a critical moment. The occurrence
of a smaller conflagration one month later may or may not harmonize
with this idea, but it does seem to emphasize the suggestion of the
storage of large volumes of gas which were not wholly set free on the
first occasion. In endeavoring to account for the source of the gases,
three explanations have been found to be possible:

1. The area protected by the barrier beach is, as already noted,
somewhat depressed. It extends from the beach to a stone wall which
may be seen just beyond the two elm trees ; and from the square house
to an almost equal distance beyond the corner of the hotel piazza on
the right. It was originally occupied by Sir William Pepperrell as a
deer park, but later it was utilized as a tan-yard.

Some years since two drains were laid through this area in such
a way as to make sections of its entire extent. The ditches were car-

56o POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

ried down through the superficial deposits to a clay formation, which
is presumably of Pleistocene age, and this clay formed the foundation
for the tan vats located in the surface stratum. The excavations
disclosed numerous, scattering fragments of leather and tan bark, suf-
ficiently ample to make the former use of the locality quite manifest;
but nowhere were there any local accumulations of a nature or in such
quantity as to explain the formation of gas in any appreciable volume.
Moreover, had gases formed there they would most naturally have
worked upward through the permeable soil and thus they would have
escaped directly into the atmosphere rather than have taken a seem-
ingly impossible course down a slope for a distance of some two hun-
dred feet or more. It is, moreover, about eighty years since tanning
operations were carried on in that locality, and the conditions of the
soil render it unlikely that any very large amount of gas could be
stored there for that length of time. The theory that the gases had
their origin in the decomposing organic debris of a tan-yard must
therefore be dismissed as untenable.

2. The Atlantic coast line, probably throughout its entire extent,
is undergoing depression at the rate of about two feet per century.
This leads to a variety of well-defined changes, among which may be
mentioned the gradual silting up of protected areas, the submergence
and final burial of forests and the formation of marsh lands. No-
where are these changes better exemplified than in the neighborhood of
Eye in New Hampshire, and Kittery and York in Maine, for the rea-
son that they are developed within areas of such size, and within
periods of such short duration, as to be brought well within the experi-
ence of individual observers.

Wherever silting occurs, and more particularly where marsh lands
are formed, large volumes of gas are generated and may be readily
observed rising to the surface of the water at more or less frequent
intervals. In the case of the silted areas the gas is obviously the prod-
uct of vast quantities of Zostera, supplemented by other forms of or-
ganic remains, both plant and animal. In the marsh lands the gas
is the normal end product in the decay of the lower portions of the
marsh turf. This gas generally accumulates in the turf and in the
silt below, sometimes being held in pockets in such large volume that
when suddenly liberated its effects are overpowering. For one who
is at all acquainted with such marsh lands it is not difficult to reach
an explanation as to the production of gas in sufficient volume and of
the proper kinds to produce all the phenomena under consideration.
It was therefore felt that there might be a small, buried marsh beneath
the beach at Kittery Point, and an attempt was made to solve the
question by direct examination, with the following results :

For a depth of about seven inches the beach consists of a fine and
compact sand worked into a layer of great firmness. Below this, as
far down as it was possible to go without the use of special methods,

A BLAZING UK AC 11

561

the deposit consists of large beach pebbles mixed with coarse sand. So
far as a buried marsh was concerned, the results were entirely of a
negative character, but from the fact that there is a deposit of clay
farther down, as well as from critical studies of the formation of
marsh lands and of silted areas, prosecuted during the past summer,
there seems to be great probability that one or both of such formations
may lie beneath the beach at a horizon which could not be reached.
In the absence of positive data, however, this source of gas must be

A Beach at Kittery Point, Maine; the scene of a conflagration, September, 1905.

neglected, and the third alternative must be brought under consid-
eration.

3. In making a section of the lower beach, as already recorded,
it was observed that the superficial layer of sand, that which is directly
acted upon by the water, consists of about one inch of freshly washed,
fine sand with which are mingled numerous fragments of marine plants
and even fragments of land plants, most of them in a fresh state but
broken into small pieces by the recent action of the water and sand.
Below this is a deposit of sand about six inches thick. This layer rests
directly upon a mixture of beach pebbles and coarse sand extending to
an unknown depth. It is the six-inch, or second, layer in which interest
chieflv centers, since we find it to contain all sorts of organic debris,
including marine algae, fragments of drift wood and bones of land
animals. It in fact constitutes the general receptacle for all those
organic remains which have been ground up in and transferred to it
by the surface layer. It is clear that while this second layer may
remain of approximately equal thickness, its organic content is con-

VOL. LXX. — 36.

562 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

stantly augmenting and at the same time undergoing decay. This is
finally expressed in the deep black color of the stratum, by the car-
bonized fragments of marine algae, driftwood and even of bones, show-
ing that within this zone there are developed precisely those conditions
which would be productive of gases in considerable volume.

It is this last explanation which affords the chief basis of a tenta-
tive hypothesis respecting the origin of the gases producing the con-
flagrations, though it is also highly probable that other volumes of
gas originated at a greater depth in a buried marsh, or in silt deposits
which were subsequently overlaid by a pebbly beach.

This phenomenon, while peculiarly interesting in itself, serves as
a means of explaining the possible origin of many obscure forest fires
for which it has hitherto been impossible to find an adequate explana-
tion, and in considering this important aspect of the question we are
not to overlook the possibility of accounting for fires which have oc-
curred in past geological ages, as well as those of recent date.

In 1905, Arthur Hollick directed attention to the presence of
charred wood in the Cretaceous deposits at Kreischerville, Staten
Island, New York, and drew the inference that since man was not
in existence at that time, the fire must have been due to some natural
agency, probably lightning. This explanation, however, was not re-
garded by him as wholly satisfactorj', and it was adopted tentatively
because of the absence of positive testimony in any other direction,
and also because the occurrence of fires in widely separated localities
of approximately the same geological age could not be accounted for
through the medium of such an agency.2 In a more recent communi-
cation on this subject,3 the same author observes that some of the
fragments of burned wood are charred on the outside only, while other
smaller fragments are completely charred throughout. " These latter
occur in greatest abundance in connection with layers or seams of
yellowish, sandy clay. The prevailing colors of the Cretaceous sands
and clays throughout this locality are white and gray, while the yellow
layers are of quite limited extent and appear to have been burned
or baked. It seems therefore reasonable to infer from this association
of materials, that the charred wood was not deposited with the clay
in the condition of charred wood, but that it was fresh material at
the time of deposition and was subsequently burned in place, thus
baking the enclosing clay."

"A careful study of the Kreischerville deposits indicates very
clearly that the original conditions of deposition must have been
strikingly similar to those described as existing at the Kittery Point
Beach. The layers of vegetable debris and sand, intercalated in
the clays are comparable to the sandy layer of black, organic debris

2Proc. Nat. Sci. Assn. 8. I., Vol. IX., 1905, pp. 35, 36.
8 Proc. 8. T. Assn. Arts and Sciences, Vol. I., 1906, p. 21.

.1 BLAZING BEACH 563

in the beach, and it is reasonable to infer that wherever such con-
ditions prevail, similar phenomena of combustion may occur," and
he therefore finds that the explanation of the Kittery phenomenon
is not only satisfactory in that case, but that it affords a satisfactory
solution of the way in which fires originated in Cretaceous time.

In 1900, Dr. G. F. Matthew of St. John, i\T. B., described a bog
in the vicinity of that city which gave evidence of the occurrence of
a forest fire about two thousand years ago, this estimate of age being
based upon the age of growing trees, the thickness of individual layers
of peat, and the relative density of different layers, together with
the known rate of formation as determined by the age of trees in situ.*

Evidences of ancient forest fires are to be met with in other
bogs to which Dr. Matthews directs attention, and it is altogether
probable that they had a similar origin. The agency of lightning
is excluded as not tenable because of the thorough knowledge of the
bogs in question for a period of from 6,000 to 9,000 years, and from
the evidence at hand the conclusion is reached that they must have
been due to the early inhabitants of the district who knew nothing
as to precautions against the spread of fire, and who would have
been but little likely to have adopted them had they been known.

Upon a careful examination of the account given by Dr. Matthews,
it would seem that the situation of the burned wood within the area
of a bog is a distinct argument against man as the active agent, be-
cause if he had been the cause of the fires, evidence of them should
be found in the more elevated areas about the shores of the bog, but
of this the account gives no information and we are left to infer
that only the bog itself was involved. Furthermore, the features
of deposition and the general character of the various strata, point
with some force to the idea that we have here another example of a
fire due to the spontaneous combustion of gases generated in the
inferior strata where decomposition was evidently active.

Apart from its more strictly scientific aspects, the occurrence of
such a conflagration as that which developed at Kittery Point gives
a most singularly striking manifestation of a phenomenon which,
as developed upon a very limited scale, has been a matter of common
knowledge for a very long time, and has been woven into the folk-
lore of various countries, where it has often played an important
part in the life of the common people. Among English-speaking
people the well-known ' corpse-candle,' ' Jack-o'-lantern/ and ' ignis
fatuus' take a most conspicuous place in the superstitions of the less
educated portions of the community, both in Europe and in America,
even to the present day, although the scientific explanation has long
since been accepted and understood.

4CA Forest Fire at St. John, about 2,000 Years Ago.' Can. Rec. Sc, VIII.,
1900, pp. 213-218.

564 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Occidentals, however, by no means enjoy a monopoly of the ro-
mances and legends which may be gathered about the flickering flame
of the elusive ignis fatuus. Very few countries have developed so
rich a folk-lore as the Japanese, and the very fertile imaginations
of her people have not failed to apply many weird explanations to
an object capable of so many interpretations, sometimes investing their
' ghost-fire ' with the same attributes that attach to our ' corpse-candle ' ;
again attributing to their 'demon-light' the possession of singularly
baleful influences ; or in the ' badger-blaze,' ' fox-flame ' and ' dragon-
torch ' finding a medium for the most varied witchery, . sometimes
comical, sometimes serious, and not always devoid of tragic results.

According to accounts by Brinkley, it is related of the ' badger-
blaze' that it wanders in the Kawabe district of Settsu on rainy
nights, and that uninitiated rustics, mistaking it for the glowing
pipe of an ox-driver, hold commune with the badger, who is at all
times a sociable fellow, and have even lit their own tobacco at his
and puffed it in his company. Or again, at the base of the Ivatada
hills, in the province of Omi, there lies a lake from whose margin
on cloudy nights in early autumn a little ball of fire emerges. Creep-
ing toward the foot of the mountains, it grows as it goes, sometimes
swelling to a brilliant sphere three feet in diameter, sometimes not
developing to more than a third of that size, but always when it rises
to the height of a man's stature above ground, showing within its
glow two faces, to which gradually the bosses of two naked wrestlers,
struggling fiercely, attach themselves. It takes its way slowly and
harmlessly to the recesses of the hills, but resents, with superhuman
force, any attempt to interrupt its passage. Once a wrestler of un-
conquered fame waited at midnight for its coming, and sprang to
grasp it as it passed through the mists. He was hurled to a distance
of ten or twelve yards and barely escaped with his life.

The fox is an animal particularly addicted to assuming a great
variety of shapes and disguises, often entering into and taking pos-
session of people for evil purposes, or otherwise imitating various
natural or artificial objects, thereby giving rise to great confusion
or even distress, as witness the phantom train on the Tokaido railway
some years since, which so terrified and confused an engineer as to
nearly cause a disaster. Among other disguises of this animal is that
of the so-called 'fox-flame,' which is assumed at night in dangerous
and solitary places. The initiated, however, may readily overcome
the spells of the ' fox-flame,' since all that is necessary is to join
hands so as to leave a diamond-shaped opening between the crossed
fingers. By blowing through this opening in the direction of the
light, at the same time repeating a Buddhist formula, it is possible
to extinguish the witch-fire at any distance.

THE VUOUUESX OF XCIEXCE

565

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

LORD LISTER

Lister was born on April 5, 1827,
and his eightieth birthday has been
the occasion for congratulations from
all parts of the world. A large and
influential international committee has

resolved to commemorate the occasion
by publishing in quarto form a collec-
tion of his scientific works. A depu-
tation waited on Lord Lister on April
5 to ask his approval of the plan, at
which time he expressed his apprecia-

LORD LISTER.

566

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

tion and willingness that the plan
should be carried into effect.

The great discovery of the antiseptic
method in surgery was first announced
in 1867. In an address before the
meeting of the British Medical Asso-
ciation held in Dublin in that year,
Lister said: "When it had been shown
by the researches of Pasteur that the
septic property of the atmosphere de-
pended, not on the oxygen or any gase-
ous constituent, but on minute organ-
isms suspended in.it. which owed their
energy to their vitality, it occurred to
me that decomposition in the injured
part might be avoided without exclu-
ding the air, by applying as a dressing
some material capable of destroying
the life of the floating particles."

Lister used carbolic acid as an anti-
septic, and although the methods were
at first imperfect, the results were re-
markable. The wards of which he had
charge in the Glasgow Infirmary were
especially infected with gangrene, but
in a short time became the healthiest in
the world ; while other wards, separated
by a passageway, retained their infec-
tion. Like all great discoveries, Lis-
ter's antiseptic methods have been ex-
tended and improved, being now rather
aseptic than antiseptic, the precautions
being largely directed toward prevent-
ing infection by sterilization. It must
be remembered that in addition to the
work for which Lister is famous, he
has made important contributions to
surgery and the practise of medicine.
Lister's father was a member of the
Society of Friends; a man of business,
but also engaged in scientific work.
He was a fellow of the Royal Society,
as are also his son, Arthur, and his
grandson, J. J. Lister, the brother and
nephew of Lord Lister. Lister mar-
ried the daughter of the eminent sur-
geon, Professor Syme, to whose chair
at Edinburgh he succeeded. He has
no heir. Lister became assistant sur-
geon at the Edinburgh Royal Infirmary
in 1856, and moved to Glasgow as pro-

fessor of surgery in 1860, returning to
Edinburgh in 1S69. He then became
professor of clinical surgery in King's
College, London, in 1877.

Lord Lister has been honored by the
government by being raised to the peer-
age; by his fellow men of science by
his election to the presidency of the
British Association for the Advance-
ment of Science and of the Royal So-
ciety; by his colleagues in medicine
and surgery by the naming in his
honor of the Lister Institute, one of
the most important institutions in
the world for medical research. But
his highest honor is the use in every
hospital of the world of the antiseptic
system of surgery that he discovered.
This treatment has relieved endless
suffering and saved innumerable lives,
and has permitted the extension of
surgery to operations which without
it would have been impossible. It is
indeed the foundation on which modern
surgery is built.

THE CENTENARY OF THE BIRTH
OF LOUIS AGASSIZ
On May 28, 1S07, Jean Louis
Rudolphe Agassiz was born in the
Canton of Freiburg, Switzerland,
his father being pastor of the protest-
ant parish of Motier. The centenary
of his birth is being celebrated at Har-
vard University and at Cornell Uni-
versity. At Harvard there is a gather-
ing of his former pupils with addresses
by President Eliot and Professor Niles.
At Cornell, where Agassiz was non-
resident professor, a commemorative
address is to be made by Professor
Burt G. Wilder. Professor Niles and
Professor Wilder were among the
group of eminent naturalists who were
pupils of Agassiz, which includes, in
addition to his son, Mr. Alexander
Agassiz, Bickmore, Clark, Hartt, Hyatt,
Lyman, Morse, Packard, Putnam,
Scudder, Shaler, Stimpson, Tenney,
Verrill and Ward.

A biographical sketch of Agassiz
will lie found in the fourth volume of
The Popular Science Monthly. In

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

567

LOUIS AGASSI Z.

the thirty-second volume will be print here his portrait and- the fac-

found an article on ' Agassiz and Evo- simile reproduction of a letter ad-

lution,' by Professor Joseph Le Conte, dressed by him to Professor Joseph Le

and in the fortieth volume an article Conte, one of the members of a family

on 'Agassiz at Penikese,' by President distinguished for their contributions to

David Starr Jordan. As a tribute we natural science.

5s^ 4

57o

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

PREVALENCE OF THE PLAGUE IN
INDIA

From January 1 to March 16, 1907,
there have been 254,033 deaths from
plague in India, a marked increase
upon the returns for the 1906, when
the deaths from plague for the whole
year amounted to only 316,550. The
number of deaths from plague in In-
dia during the years 1904, 1905 and
1906 were respectively 1,023,815, 946,-
558 and 316,550. The number of
deaths from plague in India from Jan-
uary 1 to the middle of March during
the years 1904, 1905, 1906 and 1907
amounted to 253,903, 316,801, 70,761
and 254,033, respectively. The num-
ber of deaths during the current year
are therefore, to the middle of March,
somewhat above the number in 1904
during the year, when over 1,000,000
died of plague; they are, however, con-
siderably fewer than the deaths which
occurred during the corresponding
period of 1905, but this does not hold
for the latter part of March. The out-
look is, therefore, not hopeful. Since
plague appeared in India in the au-
tumn of 1896, the number of deaths
from the disease in India to March 16,
1907, has been 4,767,141.

These facts, for which The British
Medical Journal is the authority, are
appalling. Even in India, a human
life may be assumed to be worth
$1,000, and it seems probable that the
expenditure of $4,767,141,000 by the
British government, partly spent on
definite measures in India and partly
on scientific investigation would for-
ever abolish the plague and possibly
control all epidemics. There is now
much political unrest in India, and this
might not be allayed even by the aboli-
tion of the plague. But the present
liberal government and its secretary of
state for India should appreciate their
responsibilities and their duty.

THE POPULATION OF THE
UNITED STATES.

The Census Office issued some time
ago a ' Statistical Atlas,' prepared un-
der the supervision of Mr. Henry Gan-
nett, geographer of the twelfth census,
which gives many interesting tables and
plates, illustrating the progress of the
United States in population, vital
statistics, agriculture and manufac-
tures. We reproduce here a diagram
showing the increase of population dur-
ing the last century in the United
States and in the principal countries of
Europe.

The growth of population here, com-
pared with that in European countries,
is most striking. Only Russia has a
curve at all comparable to that of the
United States, although the German
empire shows similar tendencies during
the past decade. The vast population
of European Russia, which has about
doubled in sixty years, shows a very
constant increase, and this will be ac-
centuated should the death rate be
reduced to the proportions normal in
other countries. The results of the in-
crease of the people of Russia will
probably be the most important factor
in the history of Europe during the
coming century. Great Britain has
maintained a constant increase, and it
may be an unwarranted assumption to
suppose that this will soon be checked
by the decreasing birth rate and the
physical deterioration due to pre-
dominant town life and factory employ-
ment. The slow growth of the French
population during the century and its
present stationary condition, the birth
rate being almost as low as the death
rate, give much anxiety in that coun-
try. There were in 1903 about 20,000
fewer births than in 1902, and 32,000
fewer than in 1901. In some depart-
ments the birth rate is far below the
death rate; thus in 1903 there were in
Gers 3,333 births and 4,792 deaths; in
Lot-et-Garonne, 3,946 births and 5,718
deaths, etc.

The curve showing the increase of

THE PROGRESS OF SCIENCE

57i

■

/
/

INCREASE OF POPULATION

IN THE

UNITED STATES

ANDTHE

PRINCIPAL COUNTRIES OF EUROPE

FROM

1800T01900

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ORWAY_

The Population of the United States.

population in the United States during
the past century seems to indicate a
boundless growth. But a different in-
terpretation appears to be possible.
The percentage of increase for con-
tinental United States was remarkably
constant in each decade from that be-
ginning in 1790 to that beginning in
1850. For each period the percentages

are as follows: 35.1, 36.4, 33.1, 33.5,
32.7, 35.9 and 35.6. But in the census
of 1870 there was a sudden drop in the
percentage to 22.6, which is attributed
in part to the civil war and in part to
defective enumeration. There was a
rise in 1S80 to 30.1, followed by a fall
to 24.9 in 1890 and to 20.7 in 1900.
The decrease in percentage from 1860

572

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

to 1900 was at the rate of 3.45 per de-
cade. Should this decrease continue
the percentage of increase would cease
in 1950 and thereafter a decrease in
population would ensue. The popula-
tion of the country would then be
88 millions in 1910, 101 millions in
1920, 111 millions in 1930, 119 millions
in 1940 and 123 millions in 1950, at
which time the population of the coun-
try would have reached its maximum
and would thereafter decline. It is of
course unlikely that this will be the
future of our population. The per-
centage of increase will almost cer-
tainly become smaller, but probably
with increasing slowness. The data
from 1860 to 1900, however, give indi-
cations of these results,, and they are
more probable than the boundless in-
crease of population of the country and
of the world which lias sometimes been
predicted.

SCIENTIFIC ITEMS

At the meeting of the National
Academy of Sciences, held in Washing-
ton last week, President Ira Remsen, of
the Johns Hopkins University, was
elected president to succeed Mr. Alex-
ander Agassiz. The vacancy in the
vice-presidency thus created was filled
by the election of Dr. Charles D. Wal-
cott, secretary of the Smithsonian In-
stitution.— Members were elected as
follows: Joseph P. Iddings, professor
of petrology, University of Chicago;
Harmon N. Morse, professor of chem-
istry, Johns Hopkins University;
Franklin P. Mall, professor of anat-
omy, Johns Hopkins University, and
Elihu Thomson, Thomson-Houston and
General Electrical Companies.

Oxford University has conferred its
doctorate of science on Dr. A. Graham
Bell. — Dr. Franz Boas, professor of an-
thropology in Columbia University,
was presented on April 16 with a vol-
ui nr of researches by his colleagues and
former students in honor of the twenty-
fifth anniversary of his doctorate. —

Dr. Francis Galton has been appointed
to deliver the Herbert Spencer Lecture
for 1907, at Oxford, and proposes to
lecture on ' Probability, the Founda-
tion of Eugenics.'

Mr. Edward B. Moore, assistant
commissioner of patents, has been ap-
pointed commissioner to succeed Mr.
Frederick I. Allen, who has resigned. —
Count de Montessus de Ballore, of
Abbeville, France, one of the leading
authorities on earthquakes, has ac-
cepted a call from the government of
Chili to establish for them a seismolosr-
ical service of the first rank. This
action on the part of the Chilian gov-
ernment is a direct result of the
disastrous Valparaiso earthquake of
last August.

Among gifts to educational institu-
tions the following may be noted:
Princeton University has received from
donors whose names are for the present
withheld a gift of $1,200,000, for the
erection and endowment of two scien-
tific buildings — one for physical sci-
ence and one for biology and geology.
In each case the building will be
erected as a cost of $400,000, and
$200,000 is provided for equipment and
maintenance. — By the will of Edward
W. Currier Amherst College receives
the sum of $500,000. Two legacies are
released by Mr. Currier's death; one
of $180,000 to Williams College and
one of $100,000 to Yale University-
Mr. John D. Rockefeller has given to
the University land fronting the south
side of Midway Plaisance of the value
of $1,500,000.— Barnard College, Co-
lumbia University, has been made the
residuary legatee of the estate of Miss
Emily O. Gibbes. It is estimated that
the college may receive $750,000 — Miss
Anna T. Jeanes, of Philadelphia, has
created an endowment fund of $1,000,-
000, the income from which is to be
applied toward the maintenance and
assistance of elementary schools for
negroes in the southern states.

INDEX

573

INDEX

NAMES OF CONTRIBUTORS ARE PRINTED IN SMALL CAPITALS

Agassiz, Louis, 566; Edward Everett

Hale, 305
Age, Growth and Death, the Problem

of, Charles Sedgwick Minot, 481
Air, the Sanitation of, Konrad Meier,

19
Alaska, Glacial Erosion in, Ralph S.

Tarr, 99
Alcohol, Denatured, S. Lawrence

Bigelow, 243
Arts, The Classification of, Ira

Howerth, 429
Astronomy, Problems of, 383
Audubon, John James, C. Hart Mer-

riam, 301
Automaton, Is Man an, George

Stuart Fullerton, 149

Babbitt, E. H., A Vocabulary Test,
378

Baird, Spencer Fullerton, Hugh M
Smith, 308

Beach, A Blazing, D. P. Penhallow,
557

Berthelot and Moissan, 475

Bigelow, S. Lawrence, Denatured
Alcohol, 243

Blazing Beach, D. P. Penhallow, 557

Body, " Is the Mind in the, George
Stuart Fullerton, 452

Books and Papers, Hygienic Require-
ments in the Printing of, Edmund B.
Huey, 542

Britton, N. L., John Torrey, 297

Brooks, William Keith, Joseph Leidy,
311

Brown, Charles W., The Jamaica
Earthquake, 385

Byers, Charles Alma, The Possibil-
ities of the Salton Sea, 5

Carnegie, Foundation for the Advance-
ment of Teaching, 188; Institution,
Report of the President, 286; Re-
search Departments of, 380

Century Plant and Some Other Plants
of the Dry Country, William Tre-
lease, 207

Children, the Waste of, G. B. Man-
gold, 549

Civology — a Suggestion. Ltxdley M.
Keasbey, 365

Classification of the Arts, Ira Ho-
werth, 429

Comparative Psychology, C. Judson
Herrick, 76

Energy

and Spelling

Conservation

Reform, W. Le Conte Stevens, 265

Convocation Week Meetings, 92, 183

Cope, Edward Drinker, Henry Fair-
field Osborn, 314

Coulter, W. S., Reclamation of the
North Platte River Valley, 372

Dana. James Dwight, Arthur T. Had-

ley, 306, 229, 317, 404
Death, Age, Growth and, the Problem

of, Charles Sedgwick Minot, 481
DeLand, Fred, Development of the

Telephone Service, 48, 229, 317, 404,

518
Denatured Alcohol, S. Lawrence Bige-
low, 243
Destructive Tendencies of Modern Life,

Richard Cole Newton, 330
Douglas and Wright, Opsonic Index

of, 95
Douglass, Andrew Ellicott, Illusions

of Vision and the Canals of Mars,

464
Drug Abuses and Their Effects on the

People, J. Madison Taylor, 459

Earthquake, Jamaica, 385; Charles
W. Brown, 385

Economic Importance of Mosquitoes,
John B. Smith, 325

Education Board, General, Mr. Rocke-
feller's Gift to, 287

Environment and Race, a Study of the
Jews, Maurice Fishberg. 33

Erosion, Glacial, in Alaska, Ralph S.
Tarr, 99

Fishberg, Maurice, The Jews, a Study

of Race and Environment, 33
Flora of North America, the Progress

of our Knowledge of, Lucien M.

Underwood, 497
Fossil Insects and the

the Class Insecta,

lirsch, 55
Franklin. Benjamin,

chell, 291
Fullerton, George Stuart, Is the

Mind in the Body?, 452; Is Man

an Automaton?. 149

Geological Survey, the Directorship of

the/ 478
Glacial Erosion in Alaska, Ralph S.
I Tarr. 99

Development of
Anton Hand-

S. Weir Mit-

-??■

574

POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY

Growth, Age and Death, the Problem
of, Charles Sedgwick Minot, 481

Hadley, Arthur T., James Dwight
Dana, 306

Hale, Edward Everett, Louis Agassiz,
305

Handlirsch, Anton, Fossil Insects
and Development of the Class In-
secta, 55

Hawkins, John, Magical Medical
Practise in South Carolina, 105

Health, a National Department of, 379

Henry, Joseph, Robert S. Woodward,
299

Herrick, C. Judson, Comparative Psy-
chology, 76

Hill, Alex., The Acquisition of Lan-
guage and its Relation to Thought,
530

Howerth, Ira, The Classification of
the Arts, 429

Huey, Edmund B., Hygienic Require-
ments of the Printing of Books and
Papers, 542

Humboldt, Alexander von, Baron
Speck von Sternburg, 292

Hygiene, the Newer, Wilfred H. Man-
waring,

Illusions of Vision and the Canals of

Mars, Andrew Ellicott, Douglass,

464
India, The Prevalence of Plague in,

567
Insecta, Development of the Class, and

Fossil Insecta, Anton Handlirsch,

55
Islay, Sand-dunes of the Desert of, 1S9

Jackman, Wilbur S., Relation of
School Organization to Institution,
120

Jamaica Earthquake, Charles W.
Brown, 385

James, William, Pragmatism, a De-
fense of 207, 351

Jews, A Study of Race and Environ-
ment, Maurice Fishberg, 33

Johns Hopkins University, Founders
of the Medical Department of the,
477

Jordan, David Starr, In Search of
Truth, 134

Keasbey, Lindley M., Civology — a

Suggestion, 365

Kirkpatrick, E. A., A Vocabulary

Test, 157

Language, the Acquisition of, and its
Relation to Thought, Alex. Hill,
530

Leidy, Joseph, William Keith Brooks,
311

Lister, Lord, 565

Magical Medical Practise in South
Carolina, John Hawkins, 165

Man, Is he an Automaton, George
Stuart Fullerton, 149

Mangold, G. B., The Waste of Chil-
dren, 549

Manwaring, Wilfred H., The Newer
Hygiene,

Mars, Illusions of Vision and the
Canals of, Andrew Ellicott Doug-
lass, 464

Medical, Department of the Johns Hop-
kins University, Founders of the,
477 ; Practise, Magical, in South
Carolina, John Hawkins, 165

Meier, Konrad, The Sanitation of Air,
19

Merriam, C. Hart, John James Audu-
bon, 301

Mind, Is it in the Body?, George
Stuart Fullerton, 452

Minot, Charles Sedgwick, The Prob-
lem of Age, Growth and Death, 481

Mitchell, S. Weir, Benjamin Frank-
lin, 291

Modern Life, How shall the Destruc-
tive Tendencies be Overcome?,
Richard Cole Newton, 330

Moissan and Berthelot, 475

Montgomery, Thos. H., Fritz Schau-
dinn, 274

Mosquitoes, the General Economic Im-
portance of, John B. Smith, 325

Nature Names in America, Spencer

Trotter, 63
Newton, Richard Cole, How shall the

Destructive Tendencies of Modern

Life be met and overcome?, 330
Nobel Prizes, 91
North Platte Valley, Reclamation of,

W. S. Coulter, 372

Opsonic Index of Wright and Douglas,

95
Osborn, Henry Fairfield, Edward

Drinker Cope, 314

Penhallow, D. P., A Blazing, Beach,

557
Pioneers' of Science in America, 291
Plague in India, 567
Plant, The Century, and Some Other

Plants of the Dry Country, William

Trelease, 207
Poincare, H., Value of Science, 79,

175, 279, 338, 437, 524
Population of the United States, 570
Pragmatism, a Defense of, William

James, 193, 351
Printing of Books and Papers, Hygi-
enic Requirements of, Edmund B.

Huey, 542
Progress of Science, 90, 183, 285, 379,

475
Psychology, Comparative, C. Judson

Herrick, 76

INDEX

575

Race and Environment, a Study of the
Jews, Maukice Fishbeeg, 33

Reclamation of the North Platte Val-
ley, W. S. Coulter, 372

Rockefeller Gift to the General Edu-
cation Board, 287

Sage Foundation, 3S2

Salton Sea, the Possibilities of,
Charles Alma Byers, 5

Sand-dunes of the Desert of Islay, 1S9

Sanitation of Air, Konrad Meier, 19

Schaudinn, Fritz, Thos. H. Mont-
gomery, 274

School Organization, Relation to In-
struction, Wilbur S. Jackman, 120

Science, Progress of, 90, 183, 2S5, 379,
475, 565 ; the Value of, H. PoiNCARfi,
79, 175, 279, 338, 437, 524; Pioneers
of, in America, 291

Scientific, Items, 96, 191, 288, 384, 480,
572; Meetings of Convocation Week,
92, 183

Search of Truth, David Starr Jordan,
134

Shorter Articles, 378

Sight and Seeing in Ancient Times,
Chas. W. Super, 413

Smith, Hugh M., Spencer Fullerton
Baird, 308

Smith, John B., The General Eco-
nomic Importance of Mosquitoes, 325

Smithsonian Institution and its Sec-
retary, 285

Spelling Reform and the Conservation
of Energy, W. Le Conte Stevens,
265

Sternburg, Baron Speck von, Alex-
ander von Humboldt, 292

Stevens, W. Le Conte, Spelling Re-

form and the Conservation of
Energy, 265
Super, Chas. W., Sight and Seeing in
Ancient Times, 413

Tarr, Ralph S., Glacial Erosion in

Alaska, 99
Taylor, J. Madison, Drug Abuses and

their Effects on the People, 459
Teaching, Advancement of, Carnegie

Foundation for, 188
Telephone Service, Development of the,

Fred DeLand, 48, 229, 317, 404, 518
Thought, the Acquisition of Language

and its Relation to, Alex. Hill, 530
Torrey, John, N. L. Britton, 297
Trelease, William, The Century Plant

and Some Other Plants of the Dry

Country, 207
Trotter, Spencer, Nature Names in

America, 63
Truth, In Search of, David Starr Jor-
dan, 134

Underwood, Lucien M., The Progress
of our Knowledge of the Flora of
North America, 497

Value of Science, H. Poincare, 79,

175, 279, 338, 437, 524
Vision, Illusions of, and the Canals of

Mars, Andrew Ellicott Douglass,

464
Vocabulary Test, E. A. Kirkpatrick,

157; E. H. Babbitt, 378

Waste of Children, G. B. Mangold, 549
Woodward, Robert S., Joseph Henry,

299
Wright and Douglas, Opsonic Index

of, 95

Vol. LXX. No. 1 JANUARY, 1907

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

EDITED BY J. McKEEN CATTELL
CONTENTS

The Possibilities of Sal ton Sea : Charles Alma Byers ....... 5

The Sanitation of Air. Konrad Meier 19

The Jews ; a Study of Eace and Environment. Dr. Maurice Fishberg. 33

Notes on the Development of the Telephone Service. Fred DeLand . . 48
Fo3sil Insects and the Development of the Class Insecta. Anton Hand-

lirsch 55

Nature Names in America. Professor Spencer Trotter 63

Comparative Psychology. Professor C. Judson Herrick 76

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare 79

The Progress of Science :

The Nobel Prizes ; the Scientific Meetings of Convocation Week ; The Opsonic Index
of Wright and Douglas ; Scientific Items 90

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Professor L. H. Bailey's Plant= Breeding fourth edition

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Dr. Samuel J. Holmes's The Biology of the Frog

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Mr. Ernest Ingersoll's The Life of Animals — Mammals

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CONTENTS OF NOVEMBER NUMBER
University Control. Professor J. J. Stevenson.
The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare.
Pathogenic Protozoa. Professor Gary N. Calkins.
The Making of the Grand Cafion of the Colorado.
Professor A. R. Crook.

Notes on the Development of Telephone Service.

*hed De Land.
The Jews : a Study of Race and Environment. Dr.

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John Stuart Mill. Percy F. Bicknell.
Changes of Climate. Robert DeC. Ward.
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The Jubilee of the Coal-tar Color Industry and
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The Bogoslofs : President David Starr Jordan and

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The Development of the Telephone Service. Fred

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The Jews : A Study of Race and Environment. Dr>

Maurice Fishberg.
Physical Degeneracy or Race Suicide? Sidney Webb.
Waterway Defences of the Atlantic Coast. William

S. Rose.
The Simplification of French Spelling. Frofcssor

Brander Matthews.
The Value of Science. Professor H. Poincare.
Vesuvius in the Early Middle Ages : Dr- Charles R.

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The New Engineering Building of the University

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CONTENTS

Professor Edward L. Nichols. . , . . . ^ Frontispiece

Glacial Erosion in Alaska. Professor Ralph S. Tarr 99

The Relation of School Organization to Instruction. Professor Wilbur

S. Jackman ..-.'.' 120

In Search of Truth. President David Starr Jordan . . .... 134

Is Man an Automaton ? Professor George Stuart Fullerton . . .149

A Vocabulary Test. Professor E. A. Kirkpatrick 157

Magical Medical Practice in South Carolina. John Hawkins . . . .165

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare 175

The Progress of Science:

The Convocation Week Meetings ; The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of
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Illustrated. Cloth, $1.75 net; by mail $1.89

Professor L. H. Bailey's Plant= Breeding fourth edition

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Dr. Samuel J. Holmes's The Biology of the Frog

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Mr. Ernest Ingersoll's The Life of Animals — Mammals

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Dr. Jacques Loeb's Dynamics of Living Matter

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SUpp., 616 illustrations. $6.50 net; by mail $6.80

Mr. Parr's Electrical Engineering in Theory and Practice

By G. D. ASPINALL PARR, M.Sc, M.I.E.E., A.M.I., Mech.E., Head of the ElectricalEngineering
Department, the University, Leeds. With 282 illustrations.

Cloth, 8vo, U7 pp., $3.25 net ; by mail $3.50

OTHER BOOKS OF SCIENTIFIC INTEREST

Professor Hallock's Outlines of the Evolution of
Weights and Measures and the Metric System

By WILLIAM HALLOCK, Ph. D., Professor of Physics in Columbia University in the City of New
York, and HERBERT T. WADE, Editor for Physics and Applied Science, The New International
Encyclopedia. Cloth, 8vo, SOS pp. , $2.25 net ; by mail $2.10

Professor Major's First Steps in Mental Growth

By DAVID R. MAJOR, Ph.D., Professor of Education in Ohio State University, is a series of studies
in the Psychology of Infancy. li,+360 pp., 12mo, illustrated, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.37

publ^d THE MAC/VULL AN COMPANY 6^F™RAKVE-

The Popular Science Monthly

Entered in the Post Office in Lancaster, Pa., as second-class matter.

CONTENTS OF DECEMBER NUMBER

The Bogoslofs : President David Starr Jordan and

George Archibald Clark.
The Development of the Telephone Service. Fred

DeLand.
The Jews : A Study of Race and Environment. Dr.

Maurice Fishberg.
Physical Degeneracy or Race Suicide ? Sidney Webb
Waterway Defences of the Atlantic Coast. William

S. Rose.
The Simplification of French Spelling. Professo1"

Brander Matthews.
The Value of Science. Professor H. Poincare.
Vesuvius in the Early Middle Ages : Dr. Charles R.

Eastman.
The Progress of Science :

The New Engineering Building of the University

of Pennsylvania; The Harveian Oration, Scientific

Items.

CONTENTS OF JANUARY NUMBER

The Possibilities of Sal ton Sea : Charles Alma Byers.

The Sanitation of Air. Konrad Meier.

The Jews : a Study of Race and Environment. Dr.
Maurice Fishberg.

Notes on the Development of the Telephone Service.
Fred DeLand.

Fossil Insects and the Development of the Class
Insecta. Anton Handlirsch.

Nature Names in America. Professor SrENCER
Trotter.

Comparative Psychology. Professor C. Judson Her-
ri ck.

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincabe.

The Progress of Science :

The Nobel Prizes ; the Scientific Meetings of Con-
vocation Week ; The Opsonic Index of Wright
and Douglas ; Scientific Items.

The MONTHLY will be sent to new subscribers for six months for One Dollar
SUBSCRIPTION ORDER

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30/60 "Bird's Nests and Eggs"
50/60 "Butterflies and Moths"
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16 "Bird's Beaks"

Also in preparation a set on Wild Flowers.

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THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

EDITED BY J. McKEEW CATTELL

CONTENTS

A Defence of Pragmatism. Professor William James 193

The Century Plant and Some Other Plants of the Dry Country : Professor

William Trelease 207

Notes on the Development of Telephone Service. Fred DeLand . . . 229

Denatured Alcohol. Professor S. Lawrence Bigelow 243

Spelling Keform and the Conservation of Energy. Professor W. Le

Conte Stevens 265

Fritz Schaudinn. Professor Thos. H. Montgomery 274

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare 279

The Progress of Science:

The Smithsonian Institution and its Secretary ; The Report of the President of the
. Carnegie Institution ; Mr. Rockefeller's Gift to the Board of Education; Scientific Items 285

THE SCIENCE PRESS

LANCASTER, PA. GARRISON, N. T.

NEW YORK: Sub-Station 84
Single Number, 30 Cents Yearly Subscription, $3.00

ON AGRICULTURE

Mr. Harwood's new book The New Earth

Illustrated. Cloth, fl.75 net; by mail $1.89

Professor L. H. Bailey's Plant~ Breeding fourth edition

is entirely revised with the addition of a new chapter on current practice. The New York Evening
Post says: "We leave the book with the very strongest nssurance to our readers that any enterpris-
ing nature-lover will find it intensely interesting and valuable."

lllustruted. Cloth, 331, pp., $1.00 net ; by mail $1.11

ON ASTRONOMY

Dr. Newcomb's A Compendium of Spherical Astronomy

With Its Applications to the Determination and Reduction of Positions of the Fixed Stars. By
SIMON NEWCOMB hhk pp., 8vo, cloth, $3.00 net ; by mail $3.20

Mr. Forest R. Moulton's An Introduction to Astronomy

By FOREST RAY MOULTON, Ph.D., University of Chicago; Author of "An Introduction to Celes-
tial Mechanics." Illustrated. 18+557 pp., 8vo, cloth, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.37

ON BIOLOGY, NATURAL HISTORY, ETC.

Dr. Samuel J. Holmes's The Biology of the Frog

is an easily followed, narrative discussion of the complete life-structure of the frog.

Illustrated, cloth, 12mo, $1.60 net ; by mail, $1.71,

Dr. Ernest IngersolPs The Life of Animals — Mammals

By the author of "Wild Neighbors," "An Island in the Air," etc. The New York Sun says: "No
better book can be put into the hands of a boy tnat is interested in animals."

Illustrated with colored plates and many drawings. 555 pp., $2.00 net ; by mail $2.21,

Dr. Jacques Loeb's Dynamics of Living Matter

has attracted widespread interest from the originality of his ideas and the importance of their
Bubject. Cloth, 8vo, $3.00 net; by mail $2.23

Columbia University Biological Series

Prof. H. S. Jennings's Behavior of the Lower Organisms

A new volume in the Columbia University Biological Series, edited by HENR\ F. OSBORV and
EDMUND B. WILSON. 366 pages with about 150 figures in the text. $3.00 net; by mail, $3.20

ON ENGINEERING

Stevens & Hobart's Steam Turbine Engineering

is written from the standpoint of buyer and the user ; it deals with questions of economy in first
cost, maintenance and steam consumption, as well as with tbeory and design.

blUpp., 516 illustrations. $6.50 net ; by mail $6.80

Mr. Parr's Electrical Engineering in \ heory and Practice

By G. D. ASPINALL PARR, M.Sc, M.I.E.E., A.M.I., Mech.E., Head of the ElectricalEngineering
Department, the University, Leeds. With 282 illustrations.

Cloth, 8vo, 447 pp., $3.25 net ; by mail $3.50

OTHER BOOKS OF SCIENTIFIC INTEREST

Professor Hallock's Outlines of the Evolution of
Weights and Measures and the Metric System

By WILLIAM HALLOCK, Ph. D., Professor of Physies in Columbia University in the City of New
York, and HERBERT T. WADE, Editor for Physics and Applied Science, The New International
Encyclopaedia. Cloth, 8vo, SOS pp., $2.25 net ; by mail $2.i0

Professor Major's First Steps in Mental Growth

By DAVID R. MAJOR, Ph.D., Professor of Education in Ohio State University, is a series of studies
in the Psychology of Infancy. U+360pp., 12mo, illustrated, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.S7

published THE MACMILLAN COMPANY "l^™™1"

CONTENTS OF JANUARY NUMBER

The Possibilitiesof Salton Sea : Charles Alma Byers.

The Sanitation of Air. Konrad Meier.

The Jews : a Study of Race and Environment. Dr.
Maurice Fishberg.

Notes on the Development of the Telephone Service
Fred DeLand.

Fossil Insects and the Development of the Class
Insecta. Anton Handlirsch.

Nature Names in America. Professor SrENCER
Trotter.

Comparative Psychology. Professor C. Judson Her-

RICK.

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincabe.

The Progress of Science :

The Nobel Prizes; the Scientific Meetings of Con-
vocation Week ; The Opsonic Index of Wright
and Douglas ; Scientific Items.

CONTENTS OF FEBRUARY NUMBER

Professor E. L. Nichols. Frontispiece.

Glacial Erosion in Alaska. Professor Ralph S. Tarr.

The Relation of School Organization to Instruction.
Professor Wilbur S. Jacrman.

The Search of Truth. President David Starr
Jordan.

Is Man an Automaton? Professor George Stuart
Fullerton.

A Vocabulary Test. Professor E. A. Kirkfatrick.

Magical Medical Practice in South Carolina. John
Hawkins.

The Value of Science. Professor H. Poincare.

The Progress of Science :

The Convocation Week Meetings ; The Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching ;
The Sand-dunes of the Desert of Islay; Scientific
Items.

The MONTHLY wi!l be sent to new subscribers for six months for One Dollar
SUBSCRIPTION ORDER

To THE SCIENCE PRESS,

Publishers of THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,
Sub-Station 84, New York City.

Please find enclosed check or money order for three dollars, subscrip-
tion to THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY for one year, begin-
ning March, 1907.

Please find enclosed from, a new subscriber one olollar (sent at your
risk), subscription for six months to THE POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY, beginning March, 1907.

Name.

Address..

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Yearly Subscription, $3,00

THE SCIENCE PRESS

GARRISON-ON-HUDSON, N. Y. 41 NORTH QUEEN ST., LANCASTER, PA.

Sub-Station 84: NEW YORK

OOMP&NY

Bausch & Lomb
LANTERN -D

Lecturers who have used or seen in use the
usual type of projection lantern, with its stiff
working adjustments, lenses out of center, slide-
cracking condensers and lack of illuminating
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its scientifically constructed optical system,
powerful and accurately operated lamp, cool-
ing cell to prevent cracking slides and mechani-
cally perfect adjustments throughout.
The further fact that Lantern D can be converted
into a combined microscope and slide projector
and a projector for opaque objects is more
evidence of its uniqueness and desirability for
school and laboratory work. Catalog Free.

Bausch & Lomb Optical Co.,
Rochester, N. Y.

New York, Boston, Washington, Chicago,
San Francisco, Frankfurt a/M Germany.

Microscopical

tects

Obj

especially prepared
and classified for
the use of

Teachers and
Students in

Botany, Entomology,
Zoology, Physiology
and Bacteriology,

also

special sets of objects covering Cotton and
Woolen Fibres, Paper Making, Starches,
Pharmaceutical Preparations, etc.

The quality of our preparations is un-
equalled, while the prices are extremely
low.

We also offer over 20,000 Lantern Slides
covering a great number of Educational
Subjects. Complete catalogue free.

WILLIAMS, BROWN & EARLE,
Dept. N.913 Chestnut St., Philadelphia. Pa,

STEREOPTICON
NATURE STUDY SLIDES

We are just completing fine sets of slides on
Nature subjects comprising amongst others,

30 subjects on "Bird Babies n
30/60 "Birds' Nests and Eggs"
50/60 "Butterflies and Moths"
40 "A half hour at the seaside n
16 "Birds' Beaks"

Also in preparation a set on Wild Flowers.

Besides the above we have slides of every
part of the world. Illustrated Stories, Bible
Subjects, Educational and Comics.

OVER 20,000 SLIDES IN STOCK

FOR

SALE OR RENTAL

Slides, plain, 25c. & 35c. Colored, from 50c. each up.
Catalogues, 20c. Hire Lists, free.

RILEY OPTICAL INSTRUMENT CO.

23 East Fourteenth St., New York.

EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

By Professor EDWARD THORNDIKE

In this book Professor Thorn dike applies to a num-
ber of social, and especially educational problems, the
methods of exact science. The topics are treated in
the light of the most recent researches and with the
aid of modern statistical technique. The book thus
provides those interested in education as a profession
or as a feature of American life with a sample of
scientific method in this special field as well as with
important information which has hitherto been inac-
cessible. The attitude of the author, who is the head
of the department of educational psychology in Teach-
ers College, Columbia University, and the author of
numerous original contributions to dynamic psychol-
ogy, is that of a candid and painstaking student 0'
the work that has been done in this field and upholds
rigorous ideals of scientific accuracy and logic. The
book is so written and illustrated as to be readable
and teachable.

LEMCKE AND BUECHNER

11 East 17th St., New York

Vol. LXX. No. 4 APRIL, 1907

THE

POPULAR

MONTHLY.

EDITED BY J. McKEEN CATTELL

CONTENTS

Pioneers of Science in America :

Benjamin Franklin : Dr. S. Weir Mitchell. Alexander von Humboldt : Baron Speck
von Sternberg. John James Andnbon : Dr. C. Hart Merriam. John Torrey : Dr. N.
L. Britton. Joseph Henry : Dr. Robert S. Woodward. Louis Agassiz : The Rev.
Ed-ward Everett Hale. James Dwight Dana : President Arthur T. Hadley. Spencer
Fullerton Baird : Dr. Hugh M. Smith. Joseph Leidy : Professor William Keith
Brooks. Edward Drinker Cope : Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn 291

Notes on Development of Telephone Service : Feed DeLand . . . .317
The General Economic Importance of Mosquitoes : Professor John

B. Smith 325

How shall the Destructive Tendencies of Modern Life be met and over-
come ? : Dr. Richard Cole Newton 330

The Value of Science : M. H. Poincare 336

A Defence of Pragmatism : Professor William James 351

Civology — A Suggestion : Professor Lindley M. Keasbey 365

The Reclamation of the North Platte Valley : W. S. Coulter .... 372

Shorter Articles :

A Vocabulary Test : E. H. Babbitt 378

The Progress of Science : •

A National Department of Health ; The Research Departments of the Carnegie Insti-
tution ; The Sage Foundation ; The Problems of Astronomy ; Scientific Items . .379

THE SCIENCE PRESS

LANCASTER, PA. GARRISON, N. Y.

NEW YORK: Sub-Station 84
Single Number, 30 Cents Yearly Subscription, $3.00

ON AGRICULTURE

Mr. Harwood's new book The New Earth

Illustrated. Cloth, $1.75 net; by mail $1.89

Professor L. H. Bailey's Plant= Breeding fourth edition

Illustrated. Cloth, SSI, pp. , $1.00 net ; by mail $1. It

ON ASTRONOMY

Dr. Newcomb's A Compendium of Spherical Astronomy

With Its Applications to the Determination and Reduction of Positions of the Fixed Stars. By
SIMON NEWCOMB khk pp., 8vo, cloth, $3.00 net ; by mail $3.20

Mr. Forest R. Moulton's An Introduction to Astronomy

By FOREST RAY MOULTON, Ph.D., University of Chicago; Author of "An Introduction to Celes-
tial Mechanics." Illustrated. 18-\-557 pp., 8vo, cloth, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.37

ON BIOLOGY, NATURAL HISTORY, ETC.

Dr. Samuel J. Holmes's The Biology of the Frog

is an easily followed, narrative discussion of the complete life-structure of the frog.

Illustrated, cloth, 12mo, $1.60 net ; by mail, $1.71,

Dr. Ernest IngersolPs The Life of Animals — Mammals

By the author of "Wild Neighbors," "An Island in the Air," etc. The New York Sun says: "No
better book can be put into the hands of a boy that is interested in animals."

Illustrated with colored plates and many drawings. 555 pp., $2.00 net ; by mail $2.21,

Dr. Jacques Loeb's Dynamics of Living Matter

has attracted widespread interest from the originality of his ideas and the importance of their
gubject. Cloth, 8vo, $3.00 net; by mail $2.23

Columbia University Biological Series

Prof. H. S. Jennings's Behavior of the Lower Organisms

A new volume in the Columbia University Biological Series, edited by HENRY F. OSBORV and
EDMUND B. WILSON. 366 pages with about 150 figures in the text. $3.00 net; by mail, $3.20

ON ENGINEERING

Stevens & Hobart's Steam Turbine Engineering

is written from the standpoint of buyer and the user ; it deals with questions of economy in first
cost, maintenance and steam consumption, as well as with theory and design.

8U pp., 516 illustrations. $6.50 net ; by mail $6.S0

Mr. Parr's Electrical Engineering in Theory and Practice

By G. D. ASPINALL PARR, M.Sc, M.I.E.E., A.M.I., Mech.E., Head of the ElectricalEngineering
Department, the University, Leeds. With 282 illustrations.

Cloth, 8vo, W7 pp., $3.25 net ; by mail $3.50

OTHER BOOKS OF SCIENTIFIC INTEREST

Professor Hallock's Outlines of the Evolution of
Weights and Measures and the Metric System

By WILLIAM HALLOCK, Ph. D., Professor of Physics in Columbia University in the City of New
York, and HERBERT T. WADE, Editor for Physics and Applied Science, The New International
Encyclopaedia. Cloth, 8vo, 308 pp., $2.25 net ; by mail $2.U)

Professor Major's First Steps in Mental Growth

By DAVID R. MAJOR, Ph.D., Professor of Education in Ohio State University, is a series of studies
in the Psychology of Infancy. li+S60pp., Hmo, illustrated, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.37

PUBU5HED THE MACMILLAN COMPANY '-'XbTyokT

The Popular Science Monthly

Entered in the Post Office in Lancaster, Pa., as second-class matter.

CONTENTS OF FEBRUARY NUMBER

Professor E. L. Nichols. Frontispiece.

Glacial Erosion in Alaska. Professor Ralph S. Tarr.

The Relation of School Organization to Instruction.
Professor Wilbur 9. Jackman.

The Search of Truth.
Jordan.

Is Man an Automaton?

FULLERTON.

President David Starr

Professor George Stuart

A Vocabulary Test. Professor E. A. Kirkpatrick.

Magical Medical Practice in South Carolina. John
Hawkins.

The Value of Science. Professor H. Poincare.

The Progress of Science :

The Convocation Week Meetings; The Carnegie
Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching;
The Sand-dunes of the Desert of Islay; Scientific
Items.

CONTENT8 OF MARCH NUMBER
A Defence of Pragmatism. Professor William James.

The Century Plant and Some Other Plants of the Dry
Country : Professor William Trelease.

Notes on the Development of Telephone Service.
Fred DeLand.

Denatured Alcohol.
low.

Professor S. Lawrence Bige-

gpelling Reform and .the Conservation of Energy.
Professor W. Le Conte Stevens.

Fritz Schaudinn. Professor Thos. H. Montgomery.

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare.

The Progress of Science :

The Smithsonian Institution and its Secretary ;
The Report of the President of the Carnegie Insti-
tution ; Mr. Rockefeller's Gift to the Board of Ed-
ucation ; Scientific Items.

t@T The MONTHLY will be sent to new subscribers for six months for One Dollar

SUBSCRIPTION ORDER

To THE SCIENCE PRESS,

Publishers of THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY,
Sub-Station 84, New York City.

Please find enclosed check or money order for three dollars, subscrip-
tion to THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY for one year, begin-
ning April, 1907.

Please find enclosed from a new subscriber one dollar (sent at your
risk), subscription for six months to THE POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY, beginning April, 1907.

Name „

Address..

Single Numbers 30 Cents Yearly Subscription, S3.00

THE SCIENCE PRESS

GARRISON-ON-HUDSON, N. Y. 41 NORTH QUEEN ST., LANCASTER, PA.

Sub-Station 84: NEW YORK

Bausch & Lomb
LANTERN -D

Lecturers who hav« used or seen in use the
usual type of projection lantern, with its stiff
working adjustments, lenses out of center, slide-
crackiDg condensers and lack of illuminating
power will appreciate this new lantern with
its scientifically constructed optical system,
powerful and accurately operated lamp, cool-
ing cell to prevent cracking slides and mechani-
cally perfect adjustments throughout.
The further fact that Lantern D can be converted
into a combined microscope and slide projector
and a projector for opaque objects is more
evidence of its uniqueness and desirability for
school and laboratory work. Catalog Free.

Bausch & Lomb Optical Co.,
Rochester, N. Y.

New York, Boston, Washington, Chicago,
San Francisco, Frankfurta/M Germany.

STEREOPTICON
NATURE STUDY SLIDES

We are just completing fine sets of slides on
Nature subjects comprising amongst others,

30 subjects on " Bird Babies *
30/60 " Birds' Nests and Eggs"-
50/60 "Butterflies and Moths"
40 **A half hour at the seaside n
16 "Birds' Beaks "

Also in preparation a set on Wild Flowers.

Besides the above we have slides of every
part of the world. Illustrated Stories, Bible
Subjects, Educational and Comics.

OVER 20,000 SLIDES IN STOCK

FOR

SALE OR RENTAL

Slides, plain, 25c. & 35c. Colored, from 50c. each up.
Catalogues, 20c. Hire Lists, free.

RILEY OPTICAL INSTRUMENT CO.

23 East Fourteenth St., New York.

EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

By Professor EDWARD THORMDIKE [

In this book Professor Thorn dike applies to a num-
ber of social, and especially educational problems, the
methods of exact science. The topics are treated in
the light of the most recent researches and with the
aid of modern statistical technique. The book thus
provides those interested in education as a profession
or as a feature of American life with a sample of
scientific method in this special field as well as with,
important information which has hitherto been inac-
cessible. The attitude of the author, who is the head
of the department of educational psychology in Teach-
ers College, Columbia University, and the author of
numerous original contributions to dynamic psychol-
ogy, is that of a candid and painstaking student of
the work that has been done in this field and upholds
rigorous ideals of scientific accuracy and logic. The
book is so written and illustrated as to be readable
and teachable.

LEMCKE AND BUECHNER

U East 17th St., New York

Vol. LXX. No. 5.

MAY, 1907

THE

POPULAR SCIENCE
MONTHLY.

EDITED BY J. McKEEK CATTELL

CONTENTS

The Jamaica Earthquake. Professor Charles "W. Brown .... 385

Notes oa the Development of Telephone Service. Fred DeLand . . . 404

Sight and Seeing in Ancient Times. Professor Chas. W. Super . . . 413

The Classification of the Arts. Professor Ira Howerth 429

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare 437

Is the Mind in the Body? Professor George Stuart Fullerton . . , 452

Drug Abuses and their Effects on the People. Dr. J. Madison Taylor . 459

Illusions of Vision and the Canals of Mars. Professor Andrew Ellicott

Douglass 464

The Progress of Science:

Berthelot and Moissan; The Founders of the Medical Department of
the Johns Hopkins University; The Directorship of the U. S. Geo-
logical Survey; Scientific Items 475

THE SCIENCE PRESS

LANCASTER, PA. GARRISON, N. Y.

NEW YOEK: Sub-Station 84
Single Number, 30 Cents Yearly Subscription, $3.00

ON AGRICULTURE

Mr. Harwcod's new book The New Earth

By W. S. HARWOOD, Author of "New Creations in Plant Life," is a recital of 'the triumphs of
modern agriculture in America, of which The Independent says: " Mr. Harwood has done a great
Bervice . . . His book should be put at once into all the country libraries."

Illustrated, doth, $1.76 net ; by mail $1.89

Professor L. H. Bailey's Plant- Breeding fourth edition

is entirely revised with the addition of a new chapter on current practice. The New York Evening
Post says: "We leave the book with the very strongest assurance to our readers that any enterpris-
ing nature-lover will find it intensely interesting and valuable."

Illustrated. Cloth, SSI, pp., $1.00 net ; by mail fl.lt

ON ASTRONOMY

Dr. Newcomb's A Compendium of Spherical Astronomy

With Its Applications to the Determination and Reduction of Positions of the Fixed Stars. By
SIMON NEWCOMB M pp., 8vo, cloth, $3.00 net ; by mail $3.20

Mr. Forest R. Moulton's An Introduction to Astronomy

By FOREST RAY MOULTON. Ph.D., University of Chicago; Author of "An Introduction to Celes-
tial Mechanics." Illustrated. 18+557 pp., 8vo, cloth, $1.25 net ; by mail $1.S7

ON BIOLOGY, NATURAL HISTORY, ETC.

Dr. Samuel J. Holmes's The Biology of the Frog

is an easily followed, narrative discussion of the complete life-structure of the frog.

Illustrated, cloth, 12mo, $1.60 net ; by mail, $1.7U

Dr. Ernest IngersolPs The Life of Animals— Mammals

By the author of "Wild Neighbors," "An Island in the Air," etc. The New York Sun says: "No

better book can be put into the hands of a boy that is interested in animals." .,«-.,

Illustrated with colored plates and many drawings. 555 pp., $2.00 net ; by mail $2.21,

Dr. Jacques Loeb's Dynamics of Living Matter

has attracted widespread interest from the originality of his ideas and the importance of their
subject. Cl0lh' Svo' P-00net: bV maUft.tS

Columbia University Biological Series

Prof. H. S. Jennings's Behavior of the Lower Organisms

A new volume in the Columbia University Biological Series, edited by HENR\ F. OSBORN' and
EDMUND B. WILSON. 366 pages with about 150 figures in the text. $S.OO net; by mail, $3.20

ON ENGINEERING

Stevens & Hobart's Steam Turbine Engineering

is written from the standpoint of buyer and the user ; it deals with questions of economy in first
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How shall the Destructive Tendencies of Modern Life
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Civology— A Suggestion: Professor Lindley M.
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CCULTER.

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CONTENTS

The Problem of Age, Growth and Death : Professor Charles S. Minot 481
The Progress of Our Knowledge of the Flora of North America : Pro-
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Notes on the Development of Telephone Service. Fred DeLand . . 1 18

The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare £24

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Hygienic Requirements for the Printing of Books and Papers. Pro-
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The Waste of Children. Dr. G. B. Mangold 549

A Blazing Beach. Professor D. P. Penhallow 557

The Progress of Science: »

Lord Lister; The Centenary of the Birth of Louis Agassiz; Prevalence of the

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published THE MACMILLAN COMPANY "fSFXAT

The Popular Science Monthly

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CONTENT8 OF APRIL NUMBER

Pioneers of Science in America:

Benjamin Franklin: Dr. S. Weir Mitchell. Alex-
ander von Humboldt: Baron Speck von Sternberg.
John James Audubon: Dr. C. Hart Merriam.
John Torrey: Dr. N. L. Britton. Joseph Henry:
Dr. Robert S. Woodward. Louis Agassiz: The
Rev. Edward Everett Hale. James Dwight Dana:
President Arthur T. Hadley. Spencer Fullerton
Baird: Dr. Hugh M. Smith. Joseph Leidy: Pro-
fessor William Keith Brooks. Edward Drinker
Cope: Professor Henry Fairfield Osborn.

Notes on Development of Telephone Service. Fred
DeLand.

The General Economic Importance of Mosquitoes :
Professor John B. Smith.

How shall the Destructive Tendencies of Modern Life
be met and overcome? : Dr. Richard Cole
Newton.

The Value of Science. Professor M. H. Poincare.

A Defence of Pragmatism: Professor William James.

Civology— A Suggestion: Professor Lindley M.

TO PARR IT V

The Reclamation of the North Platte Valley: W. S.
Coulter.

Shorter Articles:

A Vocabulary Test: E. H. Baebitt.

The Progress of Science :

A National Department of Health; The Research
Departments of the Carnegie Institution; The
Sage Foundation; The Problems of Astronomy;
Scientific Items.

CONTENT8 OF MAY NUMBER

The Jamaica Earthquake. Charles W. Brown.

Notes on the Development of Telephone Service.

Fred DeLand.
Sight and Seeing in Ancient Times. Professor Chas.

W. Super.
The Classification of the Arts. Professor Ira How-

erth.
The Value of Science. M. H. Poincare.
Is the Mind in the Body ? Professor George Stuart

Fullerton.
Drug Abuses and their Effects on the People. Dr. J.

Madison Taylor.
Illusions of Vision and the Canals of Mars. Professor

Andrew Ellicott Douqlass.

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Convenient
Durable

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New construction fine
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EDUCATIONAL PSYCHOLOGY

By Professor EDWARD THORHDIKE

In this book Professor Thorn dike applies to a num-
ber of social, and especially educational problems, the
methods of exact science. The topics are treated in
the light of the most recent researches and with the
aid of modern statistical technique. The book thus
provides those interested in education as a profession
or as a feature of American life with a sample of
scientific method in this special field as well as with
important information which has hitherto been inac-
cessible. The attitude of the author, who is the head
of the department of educational psychology in Teach-
ers College, Columbia University, and the author of
numerous original contributions to dynamic psychol-
ogy, is that of a candid and painstaking student of
the work that has been done in this field and upholds
rigorous ideals of scientific accuracy and logic. The
book is so written and illustrated as to be readable
and teachable.

LEMCKE AND BUECHNER

11 East 17th St., New York

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